So today, I read this article which I wasn’t thrilled about. It said we had the 5 game road winning streak not because of the return of Huberdeau and Barkov or high analytic stats, in fact we have had low analytic stats but the reason for the streak was luck. This is not my opinion, this is what someone said on “The Hockey Writers”. Now I don’t believe in luck. In my opinion, everything happens for a reason. The reason why I have 195 twitter followers isn’t because I’m lucky but because I put out quality content that people like. That game aganist Toronto where we had all of those weird goals last year people said they were lucky bounces. They weren’t. Jokinen was attempting a pass but he didn’t fire a good pass and the puck deflected off of Toronto’s defender in. That’s not luck that’s Newton’s first law of motion stating that every object will keep going straight on the angle that it is going on unless an external force causes said object to stop, slow down or change direction. Enough about science and back to the topic. According to the article, we had the 9th worst Corsi in the league in the past 10 games. Now, of course Corsi doesn’t measure goals. One big point that hey actually mentioned in the article that blows up their own point is that our shooting percentage has jumped from 5.96% to 10.39%. This means either the goalies we were playing aren’t good or we are just putting more pucks in the back of the net. Here is another thing. From October 13, 2016 to January 23, 2017 the Panthers ranked 26th in the league in goals for with 109 and averaged 2.27 GF/GP. Since January 24th, the Panthers have 38 GF and are averaging 3.8 GF/GP. Not to mention that Huberdeau and Barkov returned during this time. Weirdly enough, while Barkov was out the offense continued at the rate it had been going at when he was healthy. However with the return of him and Huberdeau the offense jumped up. Now let’s see the stats from October 12th to February 2nd. 26th in the league with 119 goals for in 51 games averaging 2.33 GF/GP. Since February 3rd, the Panthers are 6th in the league with 30 goals in 8 games averaging 3.75 GF/GP. This is the dramatic impact from a return of some players. Another factor was that before the trip, team captain Derek Mackenzie called the trip our lifeline. That makes the team play in desperation mode. When a team is desperate they either play very good or choke under pressure. The Panthers thrived under pressure. These weren’t baby teams they beat. Every skater with the exception of McKegg and Matheson/Demers got a point on the trip.