Future Is Bright For The Florida Panthers
from Dave Hyde of the South Florida Sun-Sentnel,
It was a good series, a fun series — a season in a series, really. Game 1′s thriller was a reason to fall in love with hockey. Down 2-0, if the Panthers continued quickly out the door they’d have squandered all the good edge and positive energy of their regular season.
Even pulling to within 2-1, there were lingering questions about what it all meant. Goalie Sergei Bobrovsky was benched, then returned — and then was benched again in Game 4. He’s never played like the goalie with the NHL’s richest contract.
That money looked to weigh down the offseason, and maybe the next season or two, with five years left on a $70 million deal.
And then Game 5 happened.
Rookie Spencer Knight’s performance didn’t just make Bobrovsky’s story a secondary concern — one more for General Manager Bill Zito to solve this offseason than anything else. If possible. If someone wants to take that contract.
As it is, Knight became the future of the franchise. It seems crazy to anoint him that after he’s only played six NHL games. But sometimes you know. Dolphins coach Jimmy Johnson needed two weeks of summer practice to make a fifth-round pick in Zach Thomas his middle linebacker and cut the veteran Jack Del Rio. Jack McKeon took one September of Miguel Cabrera and said, “He’s in the lineup for as long as I’m here.”
Knight looks to be that guy.
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