‘They take care of their own’: Florida Panthers not afraid to defend teammates

For a few moments on Friday night, the Florida Panthers were holding their breath as Aleksander Barkov laid on the ice following after a hit away from the puck by the Pittsburgh Penguins’ Kris Letang.

Barkov, who was playing in his second game back after missing three games with an unspecified lower-body injury, stayed down for a few minutes before going to the dressing room to get checked out by the medical staff.

While Barkov did return to the game later in the period and was one of two Panthers to score in the shootout to seal a 3-2 win, his teammates made sure Letang knew they were not pleased with what transpired.

Sam Bennett, Matthew Tkachuk and even Anton Lundell took their turns at Letang during the second period — with Bennett and Lundell going to the penalty box for their actions — and then Sam Reinhart got his piece of Letang in overtime.

“We’re always going to respond,” said Reinhart, who scored a power-play goal and the game-deciding tally in the shootout. “It was good to see him back. He only missed a couple shifts there, but that’s the way we play. We’re a tight group. We’re always going to stick up for one another.”

That has been evident all season. Friday was merely the latest example of the Panthers backing up their teammates.

“They take care of their own,” Panthers coach Paul Maurice said. “They care about each other.”

A few other examples:

▪ Dec. 23: Forward Ryan Lomberg dropped the gloves with Vegas’ Keegan Kolesar, whose open-ice hit on Tkachuk in Game 3 of the Stanley Cup Finals essentially knocked Tkachuk out of the series. Lomberg needed one swing to get redemption.

“Credit to him for letting me get redemption for last year,” Lomberg said after that game, a 4-2 Panthers win. “He’s the guy that caught Chucky to take him out of the series. He gave me the chance to kind of even the score.”

▪ Jan. 2: Moments after the Arizona Coyotes’ Jason Zucker boarded Florida forward Nick Cousins — a move that resulted in Cousins getting a concussion and missing the past games — defenseman Gustav Forsling (rarely one to get into it) jumped in and traded blows with Zucker. Forsling’s retaliation and ensuing fight resulted in 17 penalty minutes — two for instigating, five for fighting and a 10-minute misconduct.

“He just saw the aftermath and it was a no-brainer for him,” Reinhart said then. “He’s such an important piece of this locker room. I think it says a lot about this group.”

And it wasn’t the last time the Panthers would spat with the Coyotes.

▪ Wednesday: Almost three weeks after Zucker’s boarding on Cousins, the Coyotes made their way to Sunrise for their second and final game against the Panthers. Three players from each team met up at center ice during warmups.

“Just a lot of not nice words that I probably shouldn’t repeat,” Panthers forward Jonah Gadjovich said.

The Panthers were still heated about what happened with Cousins. The Coyotes knew what was coming.

Lomberg dropped the gloves with Jack McBain after the opening faceoff. Gadjovich followed against Liam O’Brien on the next faceoff.

“Sometimes stuff like that happens,” Gadjovich said after the 6-2 Panthers win. “We’re here to answer the bell.”

Added Tkachuk, who was part of the pre-game meeting of the minds between Panthers and Coyotes players: “Last game [against Arizona] trickled over into this one. We’re here to stick up for each and every one of our teammates. We’re brothers in here. What we go through year in and year out, and throughout the season, it brings us so much closer together. ... We’re here to stick up for each and every person in this locker room.”

And that brings us back to Friday, when the team once again was there to defend a teammate. It speaks to the character of the team, Maurice said. The group is united, and their actions back it up.

“It’s too bad you can’t be down on the bench to hear the bench,” Maurice said. “It’s intense and supportive. Funny as hell. Wired. Angry. It’s emotional, and I know you’ve got to be careful about letting your emotions get the better of you, but I’d rather have a night of that than trying to wind guys up to play hard in the sport of hockey. You don’t have to wind these guys up. They come wired to the game.”