Stanley Cup Champion Panthers Getting Back To Work, Insisting It’s Time To Look Forward

Fort Lauderdale, Florida – The Stanley Cup is still on its championship journey through South Florida. It was on a basketball court with the Miami Heat this week, will be somewhere else on Thursday, and has a few more appearances scheduled after that. So, in some ways, the party associated with winning the NHL championship is still going strong.

That is, except for the Florida Panthers’ practice facility. The champions are back at work.

Stanley Cup Champion Panthers Getting Back To Work, Insisting It’s Time To Look Forward

Florida begins training camp on Thursday, and coach Paul Maurice makes one thing clear: it’s time to start preparing for the next title run, not to continue reveling in the title run that ended in June.

“There will be some backward-looking stuff, which is understandable. “We’ll handle the banner raisings, ring ceremonies, and all of the other fun stuff,” Maurice said Wednesday as the squad gathered for its annual media day. “But we’ll be very sure that our day is completely focused on what we’re doing, not living in the past.”

That message appears to be reaching its intended audience.

Most players have been back in South Florida for at least a few weeks. According to Maurice, the returning Panthers are all in better form than they were at this point last season, as evidenced by pre-camp conditioning testing. The big test comes Thursday with the first practices, and Maurice’s training camp sessions are famously difficult.

“The hangover concept, we will not believe in it,” Maurice stated. “It’s not a physical concern for us. We’re stronger than we were at this point last year, which is a testament to them because they couldn’t have improved without putting in the effort.”

Florida’s top eight scorers, Sam Reinhart, Matthew Tkachuk, Aleksander Barkov, Carter Verhaeghe, Sam Bennett, Evan Rodrigues, Gustav Forsling, and Anton Lundell, are all back from last season. Verhaeghe and Reinhart scored in Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Final, as Florida defeated Edmonton 2-1 to win its first title and avoid an epic collapse after winning the first three games of the series, and goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky returns for his sixth season as the Panthers’ go-to guy in net.

Some roster places are up for grabs, but the core from the title run remains mostly intact. Even though the Cup has been won, capping a lifelong dream for Maurice and the players, there is enough motivation to win it again.

“At the end of the day, I love what I do,” Bobrovsky added. “It is a blessing to be here today, and I am delighted to compete for the dream again. However, it makes little difference what happened in the past. I simply care about the moment at hand, which is this one.”

Things will start moving swiftly. Practices begin Thursday, and Florida plays its first two preseason games on Sunday, including the usual doubleheader versus Nashville, in which most, if not all, of the 50 or so available players in camp will play.

Stanley Cup Champion Panthers Getting Back To Work, Insisting It’s Time To Look Forward

The Cup banner will be raised on October 8, when Florida hosts Boston in the regular season opener. With that, the 82-game grind will begin. But Maurice swears that he isn’t skipping any steps, that he hasn’t even considered opening night or anything else between now and then.

“I’m not prepared for anything but Day One.” “I don’t want to think about Day 2,” Maurice stated. “You cannot win the Stanley Cup on September 19th, the first day of practice. But you may begin the process by giving yourself a chance. This will be Day One on the ice. You have to be aware of how difficult it was and do the effort and pay the price in order to give yourself a shot.”

SOURCE | AP