2025 Stanley Cup Playoffs Florida Panthers: Good Guys who Don’t ‘Shotgun Beers at Church’

Florida Hockey Now ^ | 5-26-25 | n/a

[FLNittany]

FORT LAUDERDALE — Florida Panthers coach Paul Maurice added another gem to his long collection of golden quotes on Sunday morning after being asked about his team’s humility off of the ice despite their ferociousness on it.

The Panthers are, to be sure, one of the most hated teams in the NHL due to their aggressive, take-no-prisoners style.

They certainly are not popular in some parts of their own state, much less in Canada or North Carolina.

Yet after Saturday’s 6-2 win over the Carolina Hurricanes to pull within a game of a third straight trip to the Stanley Cup Final, Brad Marchand was talking about eating ice cream during intermission.

“Is that a fact?” Maurice said when asked about Marchand’s penchant for frozen treats.

“I know he said it, that doesn’t make it a fact. You have video evidence? No? This is a conspiracy theory.’’

Matthew Tkachuk, one of the league’s top agitators, spoke Sunday about going after Sebastian Aho on Saturday two days after he took out Sam Reinhart with a low hipcheck which appears to have injured Reinhart’s knee.

“I don’t really look at it as intent or intimidation at all,’’ Tkachuk said. “It’s just sticking up for teammates. We’re a family in here. It could happen to anybody and there are 20 guys racing to stick up for a teammate. That’s just how our team is built.’’

Moments later, Maurice told a story about Tkachuk seeing a young fan who is battling cancer outside the locker room and stopping for a chat. Maurice even introduced them, joking that he quickly realized Tkachuk certainly needed no introduction. So, Paul, how could a team seemingly this unlikeable be so, well, likeable?

It is all in the context of where you run into them. On the ice? Not good guys.

Off of it, pretty chill bunch.

”I’ll ask you two questions, and they might be personal so you don’t have to answer them,’’ Maurice responded. “Have you ever shotgunned a beer? Have you ever been to church … or something spiritual? OK. Would you shotgun a beer at church? That doesn’t make you a hypocrite. There is a context and a place for all things.

“I will tell you they are honest, these men are honest. That personality is all real. I hated Matthew Tkachuk, that’s a little too strong, when I was in Winnipeg. Then you meet him, and you’re like ‘what a wonderful human being.’ “They are hard on the ice, they are. But that’s driven by how they feel about each other. They don’t want to let the other guy down. There’s a caring about them. These guys are different. Barkov’s personality is our room. Sam Bennett and his wife are raising money for cats and dogs. They are really nice people.

“And then the puck drops. Sometimes you say a prayer, sometimes you shotgun a beer. That’s like our team.’’

As for Maurice’s ice cream preference, he said his go-to is “something with cherry in it. Black cherry, raspberry. That would be good.’’

[basalt]

lol...yeah..they were FORCED to change the rules because scoring plummeted..BECAUSE OF THE TRAP DEFENSES. Thats why Mario Lemiuex retired in 1997. Just this past year...30 teams, and not ONE scored 300 goals as a teams. Thats how they scored in the 50’s and 60’s. The play is like 90% “ragged” the entire game. However gets the lucky bounces scores. Goalies cant even play the puck next to the very net they are defending...most important player on the ice and they cant touch the puck....ooooo k.. Its a very stupid looking, gimmicky game now. Trapezoids, 3 on 3 OT...2 LINE PASSES LEGAL NOW!! The skill players from the 80’s and 90’s made todays NHL obsolete. Why you people cant admit that is weird. As i said, chick basketball is more popular now...

[Swanks]

Big Hurricanes fan but Panthers are the real deal

[crusty old prospector]

I am a Stars fan and it is bad enough that they can’t score but it is boring to watch.

[basalt]

its terrible...teams go 10-15 minutes without even a shot on goal, let alone score one. Its all dump and chase and which ever teams gets the bounces scores. Very dumb looking game now.

[basalt]

you proved my point..3 top players out and zero affect. Its all very robotic and defensive. And they ALL play the same way.

[ifinnegan]

I always hear playoffs are a completely different game.

Why play the regular season if this is true.

[Alberta's Child]

I think you don't know very much about hockey.

It wasn't the "trap defenses" that drove down scoring numbers in the 1990s and early 2000s. Variations of the neutral-zone trap had been played by teams for years, most effectively by the Montreal Canadiens during their 1970s dynasty -- when they were consistently leading the NHL with 350+ goals per season.

The decline in NHL scoring could be attributed to three main factors:

1. Dramatic advances in the quality of goaltending, starting with the emergence of Vladislav Tretiak in the Soviet Union and the arrival of Patrick Roy and Grant Fuhr in the NHL as the first truly athletic goaltenders who were coached to play the position from the time they were children.

2. The rapid increase in the average player size, which effectively shrank the ice and made it harder to find good scoring opportunities.

3. The move away from the three-line (forwards) and two-pair (defensemen) game management model to a modern system where most coaches roll four forward lines and three defense pairs. This was done to keep players fresh and avoid wearing down top players over the course of a long season.

[crusty old prospector]

Everything is along the boards. No one skates down Main Street. Short shifts. Teams have an edge and instead of advancing, they dump it in for a change. Defensemen never get involved.

[Ultra Sonic 007]

Just this past year...30 teams, and not ONE scored 300 goals as a teams

The Avalanche scored 302 last season.

The Oilers and the Bruins breached 300 in the year before that.

Five teams breached 300 in the '21-'22 season.

You get the idea.

Also, if the low amount of scoring is your issue, why would you want to make a goaltender more effective by removing the Martin Brodeur rule that implemented the trapezoid? (Especially since the amount of scoring in the "dead puck" era was so low between the mid-'90s and early-'00s that it even made ideas like the goalie trapezoid palatable at all.)

[basalt]

this is the only sport thats gone backwards in scoring. The few times you mentioned teams scoring 300 goals..they did it on like the the last day of the season. But the point you are missing..if only 2 teams scored 300 goals, that means 30 other ones didnt. The NHL is a shell of what it used to be...even after all the gimmicky, bizarre rule changes, its still a boring, robotic, nameless, faceless league. After What the skilled players of the 80’s and 90’s did, the NHL game today is obsolete. Best thing they could do is just cease operations and just rename the league and start fresh. New definition of “skill”..new record book, NEW EVERYTHING. Dumbasses ruined thier own game...

[Alberta's Child]

Dude, I don't know what kind of hockey you've been watching. Hockey players are more skilled today than ever before. Even Wayne Gretzky has said that he's not sure he'd even be capable of playing in the NHL today.

1. How the heck did Alex Ovechkin -- who played his entire career in this era when you claim goal scoring is way down -- break Gretzky's record for career goals?

2. One of the problems the NHL has today is that it seems like everyone except the top stars are getting out of the game at a younger age than ever before. The game is so much faster and more physically demanding that players are way past their primes by the time they reach the age of 32. The days of Nicklas Lidstrom winning a Norris Trophy at the age of 40 or Jaromir Jagr playing a regular shift for 82 games at the age of 45 are over.

The skill level in the NHL today is unbelievable. Goals like this aren't uncommon anymore:

The game is played in three dimensions today more than ever before. Even the threaded passes three feet off the ice have made their way into the game:

[USS Alaska]

Habs swept Florida during the season.

Would’ve been interesting match up in the playoffs.Would've been, coulda been, shoulda been.

What's a Hab? And don't bother with an answer, I know but no one cares.

PS: We don't want Canada as the 51st state, but Alberta, OK.

[ifinnegan]

Alberta 51.

Quebec independent.

[basalt]

cant believe you actually posted 2 tip in goals as your proof of “skill”...geez. Sorry dude, but the NHL today is obsolete, these dorks dont score anywhere near the goals that were scored in the 80’s-90’s. The ovechkin thing..he played his ENTIRE career under those goofy rule changes. He plays under the rules teams did before, he as 700 goals topps. He hung around just to break that record. Didnt do it any sooner than Gretzky did...while 99 was scoring 894 goals, he was also setting up 2000 other ones. The games been ruined and is becoming more irrelevant by the year. I mean, womens basketball is more relevant...sad.

[basalt]

once upon a time, when hockey was played normally, one of the most prestigious records was “most goals in a season”...very similiar to baseball and most HR’s in a season. Anyway, Rocket Richard has that record for many seasons. Then Bobby Hull came along and got the record with 54 goals. Then he broke his own record with 58. Then Phil Esposito, on those great Bobby Orr led Bruin teams,scored 76 and he held that record for 10 years! Then along comes Wayne Gretzky and he pulverizes Espos record with an astonishing 92 goals in a season. Well, its going on 44 years now and no ones comes close to breaking it..44 YEARS. Its so far out of reach, that the record its self isnt even discussed anymore. Modern hockey never even mentions it...thats what i mean by todays game being obsolete...same with career points...season points...playoff points..team scoring records..ALL OF IT!. Just shut down the NHL, re name the league, and just start all over again. New record book, everything. Start from when they made all the silly rule changes, 2005, and just go from there. Heres a sample of how it would look...

most career goals a.ohvechkin-897***
most goals in a season...a. matthews -69
most assists in a season.. c. mcdavid- 100
most points in a career S. Crosby-1730
most points in a season..c mcdavid- 153

now isnt that much better??..No more bogeyman Wayne Gretzky to ruin everything. No more scary Edmonton Oilers scoring records to deal with. It would be like it all never happened, it was all just a bad dream.....AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH..you guys are pathetic.

[Alberta's Child]

I believe Wayne Gretzky was the greatest athlete in the history of North American sports -- and it's not even close.

But you're posting his outlandish statistics as if they were some kind of norm. They're not. They're outlandish. And he'd be the first to admit that he posted those remarkable numbers because he had the good fortune of playing under perfect conditions -- at a time when offensive numbers were generally through the roof in the aftermath of the NHL-WHA merger, with subpar goaltending across the board, and on a team loaded with talent that played an aggressive offensive game. His first season in Los Angeles was the last time he reached the 50-goal mark, and his third season was the last time he reached 40. Ovechkin passed Gretzky's career total because he was able to be a dominant scorer long after the age when Gretzky tailed off dramatically.

Leave Gretzky's numbers aside, and look at the players whose career totals are just BELOW his. There are lots of players from the 1980s and 1990s among them, but you're seeing more recent players creeping into that elite group. Ovechkin has already passed Gretzky for all-time goals. Crosby is #10 all-time for assists and will end up in the top five if he gets 100 more in his career (certainly achievable). Crosby is #9 on the all-time scoring list and can pass Mark Messier at #3 with 200 more points. Auston Matthews is actually on a higher goal-per-game pace than Ovechkin, and neither one of them has even scored 70 in a season.

It's the goaltending records that have been broken with boring regularity since 1990s -- and that's one of the biggest factors in the decline of scoring in the 1990s and early 2000s.

[Alberta's Child]

Look at those videos closely, dude.

The first one isn't just a deflection. It's a deflection out of mid-air on a puck that was deliberately passed to him 18 inches off the ice ... and he redirected the puck into the net exactly where he wanted it to go.

The second one is a pass that is threaded through the air past two defenders who are positioned well to defend the play ... and was made precisely where it needed to go to land on the ice right where his teammate's stick blade would redirect it on net.

I PLAYED hockey for 15 years -- and I'm telling you that these are exceptional plays that have become ordinary in today's NHL. I challenge you to find similar video clips from Gretzky's heyday in the 1980s.

[basalt]

not one word about the bizzaro rule changes....if 99 had those rules, hed have scored 2000 goals. You need help...

[Alberta's Child]

What “buzzard” rule changes? Eliminating the center red line for two-line passes? That put the NHL on par with IIHF rules that had been in place for years.

[basalt]

lol...sugar coat it all you want..its a nameless, no skill league now. No matter what ovechkin, crosby, mcdavid etc do, they had to do it with “special rules” to help them score. The NHL was doing fine for 87 years. then suddenly they had to change all the rules. Thats why Lemiuex retired in 1997,...called it a “no skill, garbage” league. Then they do all these weird rule changes. Whoever heard of the most important player on the ice not being allowed to play the puck. Name what other game that does that. Its just a boring, gimmicky game now. But hey, if you like 2-1...3-2 robotic games, enjoy yourself. You are a dying breed. Game is obsolete now...just scrap it and start all over.