Welcome to the Florida Panthers Season Preview  Pre-Season Edition  for 2016-17 (FYI, the next one will be out sometime between October 8th and 13th ). I will talk about a lot of stuff here so please bear with me.

PROJECTED OPENING NIGHT ROSTER

#1 Roberto Luongo (Goalie); #3 Keith Yandle (Defense); #5 Aaron Ekblad (Defense); #6 Alex Petrovic (Defense); #7 Colton Sceviour (Forward); #11 Jonathan Huberdeau (Left Wing); #13 Mark Pysyk (Defense); #16 Aleksander Barkov (Center); #17 Derek MacKenzie (Center); #18 Reilly Smith (Right Wing); #19 Mike Matheson (Defense); #21 Vincent Trocheck (Center); #22 Shawn Thornton (Right Wing); #27 Nick Bjugstad (Center); #36 Jussi Jokinen (Left Wing); #48 Logan Shaw (Forward); #55 Jason Demers (Defense); #68 Jaromir Jagr (Right Wing); #77 Steven Kampfer (Defenseman); #81 Jonathan Marchessault (Forward); #90 Jared McCann (Forward); #92 Kyle Rau (Forward); #? James Reimer (Goalie)

Huberdeau-Barkov-Jagr; Jokinen-Trocheck-Smith; Sceviour-Bjugstad-McCann; Rau-MacKenzie-Marchessault;

Matheson-Ekblad; Yandle-Demers; Pysyk-Petrovic;

Luongo/Reimer

Scratched: Thornton; Shaw; Kampfer

LAST SEASON
47-26-9 (103 Points) or 1st in Atlantic

Scoring Leaders: Goals- Barkov (28); Assists- Jokinen (42); Points- Jagr (66)

THIS SEASON

I think the Panthers will finish with 104 Points with a record of 48-26-8 and it will be a close race with Tampa for the top spot however I do think we will win the Atlantic. Instead of a 12 game winning streak and three 5 game winning streaks, I think we will have two 7 game winning streaks and three 5 game winning streaks.

Projected Scoring Leaders: Goals- Barkov (33); Assists- Yandle (40); Points- Barkov (71)

MAJOR KEYS

Here are some major keys this season

1- Stay Healthy

The Cats need to stay healthy. There was a point last year where we had Greg McKegg, Kyle Rau, Logan Shaw, John McFarland, Brent Regner and Mike Matheson all playing in a range of a single month and that was in February.

We need Barkov to play more than 66 games. We need everyone healthy. Our prospect pool isn’t deep. I’d hate to see our bottom six be basically: Sceviour-McCann-Shaw and Rau-McKegg-Thornton. We are deep at D with McCoshen, Kampfer and Kindl but at Forward we aren’t that deep.

2- No more than 55 games for Luongo and 77 games for Jagr

Gerard Gallant listen carefully, Luongo needs rest and if we play him over 55 games we are dead in the playoffs and Jagr we need him healthy too. Now I know how Jags loves to play but he won’t do nothing in the postseason without rest. We need them to be playing well and healthy for the playoffs.

 

This is what we need to do in order to be successful.

TEAMS WE NEED TO BEAT

These are key teams who must be defeated at least 3 times (Division); 2 times (Metropolitan) and 1 time (West)

Pittsburgh, Tampa Bay, Boston, San Jose, Washington, Chicago

That is it for the team preview. Please scroll down because I have something important I need to discuss.

COMMUNICATION

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