Florida Panthers Are The Standard on How Teams Play in the NHL

The Florida Panthers and Los Angeles Kings meet in their final preseason tilt in Quebec City on Saturday night. Florida won the Stanley Cup last season and has gone to the Final two seasons in a row. They have set the standard for how teams compete and play each night.

Los Angeles Kings head coach Jim Hiller praised the Panthers’ play, which will be a good test for his club before the regular season starts on Thursday.

“Well, I said this before, they play like a team. So to win, you have to be a team,” Hiller said. “They’re the standard. They won the Cup, so they’re the standard.”

The Panthers play a mean and physical style. It may not be pretty, but they are committed to it. After his team fell to the Panthers in the Eastern Conference, New York Rangers forward Chris Kreider understood how committed each player was to the system and their role.

As you saw last year, the players bought into head coach Paul Maurice’s style of play. There were no nights for the players or any team they played. Hiller and the Kings are trying to instill this in their players.

But this style of play goes back to the 1970s with the Montreal Canadiens and was made famous by the New Jersey Devils of the 1990s. As Hiller points out, the Florida Panthers play as a team.

“I know there’s 32 teams, but you can be a tighter team than some of your competitors, and I think it was clear that the Florida team was an extremely tight group of players,” Hiller said. “So they were the ultimate definition of a team. They played hard for one another. They played a style of play that wins, which maybe isn’t the most fancy style of play, but they played a style. They committed to a style of hockey that wins. They went to the net hard. They threw pucks at the net. They made it hard on you through the neutral zone.” 

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Paul Maurice has wanted his team to play this style for a while now. It took some time in the first season, but the players have gotten to a level where he agrees with Hiller that the Panthers’ work ethic is the standard for others to follow.

“There’s a certain level of style of game that we play, and I don’t think we’re necessarily the talent or the standard on a talent basis,” Maurice said. “I think there are more talented teams than we are, but we’ve been pretty darn consistent with our game. That might be our strength, and we do play hard.” 

This will be a good test for the Kings to see where they stack up when playing the Florida Panthers. Los Angeles played another good team in Boston on Thursday night and showed they could hang out with them. It is a different level on Saturday night with the defending champs.

“They’re obviously a great team. They won the Cup last year, so it’ll be a lot of fun to play against them. It’ll be another great game,” Kings forward Alex Turcotte said when asked what it will be like to play against the Panthers. Boston’s great team, too. So I think you want to play against really good teams and see where you’re at, and it’ll be a lot of fun.” 

However, the Kings will focus on bringing their physical play style to the table and their game. Kings defenseman Kyle Burroughs told Full Press Hockey that they are not worried about what other teams do.

“I didn’t think of it like that, but I think you look at that roster, it’s good team over there. Obviously, they, like you said, they won the Stanley Cup, and, yeah, we’re gonna play our game especially in these preseason games,” Burroughs said. “I think we’re more worried about what we do and how we react, rather than pre-scouting other teams, and looking into that, deep into it, but we’re gonna come on hard and play our style.”

This should be fun as the Kings wrap up their two-game set in Quebec City against the Stanley Cup Champions.