Don’t look now, but the Panthers’ power play is improving. The numbers say it’s no fluke.

The definition of insanity, as the saying goes, is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results, but Paul Maurice has insisted all season his belief to the Florida Panthers’ floundering power play was justified.

Finally, he’s starting to look like he might be vindicated.

“It’s been a little bit frustrating,” the coach said Wednesday, “but that’s OK.”

After posting some of the worst power-play numbers in the NHL for the first seven games of the season, the Panthers are finally starting to see their extra-man numbers normalize a bit. After scoring another power-play goal Wednesday in a 3-0 shutout of the Carolina Hurricanes, Florida is now putting up something close to league-average numbers across its past seven games.

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The signs, Maurice said, were always there, and the Panthers (8-5-1) are finally starting to get rewarded for some of the scoring-chance creation they have had on the power play all along.

In those last seven, Florida is 6 of 25 on the power play — a 24 percent mark would be tied for 13th in the NHL this year and seventh in the league across a full season last year.

“We have the right mind-set,” said star center Aleksander Barkov, who scored his third power-play goal of the season against the Hurricanes.

From an analytical standpoint, the Panthers’ ineptitude on the power play was “highly unusual,” as Maurice put it. So far in the 2022-23 NHL season, Florida ranks third in the league in shot attempts per 60 power-play minutes, eighth in shots, fourth in scoring chances and third in high-danger chances. It all bears out in one telling number: The Panthers rank fourth in the NHL in expected goals per 60 power-play minutes.

None of it, however, squared with the reality. Florida ranks third to last in goals per 60 power-play minutes and power-play percentage.

It would be insane not to fix something that was broken, but there were real signs the Panthers’ power play wasn’t, even with the garish results. Now the actual results are starting to revert to the expectation.

“You just have to find your chances, and put more pucks to the net and create chances from that,” Barkov said. “Every time you get a shot at the net, it creates a little bit of chaos in front of the net, so we have really good guys at the net who can create chances from there, who can put the rebounds in, tip the pucks in, so we want to feed those guys and obviously we have good guys who can shoot, as well.”

The power-play goal against Carolina still doesn’t mean it was all good for Florida. After they peppered Hurricanes goaltender Antti Raanta with six shots on their first power play, the Panthers tested Raanta just twice on their next two chances before finally breaking through on their fourth and final opportunity, when forward Carter Verhaeghe teed up Barkov for a goal off the rush.

Florida will also get some reinforcements this weekend. All-Star right wing Matthew Tkachuk will be back from a two-game suspension Saturday to face the Edmonton Oilers at FLA Live Arena, and defenseman Aaron Ekblad is also expected return from a 10-game injury absence.

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Both stars played on the Panthers’ top power-play unit at the start of the season, with Tkachuk providing most of the chaos in front of the net and Ekblad most of the shooting punch from the outside.

The ingredients were always there for Florida to have a good power play this year — a particularly important development after the Panthers’ 1-of-13 effort on the power play in the second round of the 2022 Stanley Cup playoffs prematurely ended their season — and now it’s starting to come to fruition.

“It’ll get better,” Maurice said. “I like where it’s at right now.”

Panthers clear room for Ekblad

With Ekblad set to come off long-term injured reserve later this week, Florida loaned center Aleksi Heponiemi, and defensemen Matt Kiersted and Lucas Carlsson to AHL Charlotte to clear cap space for the two-time All-Star’s return.

Under NHL rules, players on long-term IR do not count against salary cap, so the Panthers, who began the year right up against the league’s hard cap, used Ekblad’s absence as an opportunity to call up three additional contributors from their American Hockey League affiliate and sign veteran center Eric Staal to a one-year deal.

Florida will still have to make one more move before activating Ekblad. The 26-year-old Canadian is making $7.5 million this year and the Panthers currently have about $6.8 million in cap space to use after signing Staal to a $750,000 deal while Ekblad was on LTIR.