In terms of the playoff race, the remaining games mean little for the Florida Panthers and New York Rangers.
Still there are things both teams would like to see continue when they meet on Sunday afternoon in New York.
For the Panthers, it is the continued strong play of Matthew Tkachuk, while the Rangers want more positive results from some of their recent youthful additions.
A season-ending knee injury in training camp to captain Aleksander Barkov started the injury woes for Florida, and Tkachuk missed the first 47 games with a torn adductor muscle and sports hernia before making his season debut on Jan. 19. In recent weeks, the Panthers lost Brad Marchand (lower body), Anton Lundell (upper body), Sam Reinhart (foot) along with Evan Rodrigues (broken finger).
On Saturday, the Panthers scored the first two goals in a 5-2 loss to the host New York Islanders when Tkachuk finished off a pair off a pair of breakaways. Then they were outshot 24-5 in the second and conceded five goals.
Tkachuk notched his third multi-goal game this season and has 12 goals and 27 points in 25 games since returning.
After the quick start, the Panthers (35-34-3, 73 points) fell to 2-5-0 in their past seven games.
“Nobody’s quitting here,” Tkachuk said. “The third period was definitely better than the second. We could have definitely thrown in the towel, and we didn’t.”
The Rangers are missing the playoffs for the second straight season after losing in the Eastern Conference final to Florida two seasons ago.
One of New York’s best showings was a 5-1 win against Florida in the Winter Classic on Jan. 2. Since then, the Rangers (29-35-9, 67 points) are 9-17-4 in their past 30 games.
Recently New York started working in a few call-ups from its minor league system. Gabe Perreault joined the lineup on a regular basis Dec. 18 after appearing in five games last season, and Jaroslav Chmelar, Adam Sykora, Drew Fortescue and goalie Dylan Garand also were called up from Hartford of the American Hockey League.
Each player contributed in Friday’s 6-1 rout of the visiting Chicago Blackhawks when the Rangers stopped a season-worst six-game skid (0-5-1) in their first game since being eliminated from playoff contention.
Sykora notched his first career goal while playing in his second NHL game. Fortescue made his NHL debut, played with Matthew Robertson on the defense corps and set up Jonny Brodzinski’s second goal for his first career point.
Chmelar notched his first career assist on Brodzinski’s first tally, while Garand earned his first career win by making 27 saves after a solid NHL debut last Sunday against the Winnipeg Jets in a 3-2 shootout loss.
“You never really know if a player is going to have success at the NHL level,” Rangers coach Mike Sullivan said. “We can predict all we want, whether a player is going to succeed but you never really know. You put him in there and you see how he does.”
