Panthers lose first game (and Ekblad to injury) in Boston. The good and bad from the loss

The Florida Panthers lost their first game of the 2022-23 NHL season Monday to the Boston Bruins, but they walked away with much bigger concerns than just one road loss in the first week of the season.

The Panthers started the game with only five active defenseman — and 17 total forwards — because of an injury to Brandon Montour and cap constraints, and they were down to four defensemen by the end of the second period after Aaron Ekblad exited with an unspecified injury.

Florida lost 5-3, falling behind for good on a goal by Patrice Bergeron with 7:25 left in the second period. Ekblad left immediately after the goal, limping off the ice after Jake DeBrusk beat him in a footrace to for a loose puck to assist Bergeron.

DeBrusk, on his 25th birthday, also scored in the first period before forward Sam Bennett answered with a game-tying goal in the second. Bruins forwards David Pastrnak and Trent Frederic added an insurance goals in the third to push Boston’s lead to 4-1 and the Panthers couldn’t rally at TD Garden, even after defenseman Gustav Forsling scored 27 seconds after Frederic with 7:02 left and forward Colin White slashed the lead all the way down to 4-3 with 1:37 remaining.

DeBrusk sealed his team’s win with an empty-net goal 34 seconds later.

The bad

▪ The loss of Ekblad is potentially a much bigger deal than the loss to the Bruins. Florida’s defense is already thin and got thinner Monday when Montour couldn’t go. Ekblad’s lower-body injury is potentially devastating for a unit which already lost star defenseman MacKenzie Weegar in the Panthers’ trade for All-Star right wing Matthew Tkachuk over the summer.

When he’s healthy, Ekblad is a James Norris Memorial Trophy contender, but he just hasn’t been able to stay on the ice in the last few years. In each of the last two seasons, the star defenseman missed multiple months at the end of the regular season because of an injury — a leg fracture in 2021 and a knee injury last season.

Ekblad will be reevaluated Tuesday, coach Paul Maurice said after the loss. The team is not scheduled to practice Tuesday.

Ekblad, 26, played 15:10 for the shorthanded Panthers before exiting and it would’ve been more if he hadn’t spent four minutes in the penalty box for a pair of minor penalties.

Florida finished the game with Radko Gudas, Marc Staal, Josh Mahura and Forsling as their only healthy defensemen. Those four combine for a cap hit of less than $6.7 million — less than Ekblad makes individually.

▪ The cap crunch officially became real, too, and made for challenges even before Ekblad’s injury. Montour sat out with an upper-body injury, leaving Florida a man down in Boston with just five defensemen and 17 total skaters.

NHL teams typically dress 18 skaters and six defensemen, and are allowed up to 23 players on the roster, even though only 20 can be active for any given game. Those extra three players can fill in for injured players and rotate into the lineup at will, but the Panthers don’t have the cap space to carry more than the 20 players currently active.

They’re hardly alone in carrying the minimum of 20 players. Nine teams across the league are carrying just 20 or 21 because the league’s cap has gone up only $1 million in the last four years — a product mostly of the COVID-19 pandemic and its resulting revenue concerns.

The Panthers could get some relief Wednesday when they come home to Sunrise for their home opener against the Philadelphia Flyers. NHL teams are typically allowed to make emergency call-ups if they dont have two healthy goaltenders, six healthy defensemen or 12 healthy forwards, and Florida will have enough time to get someone down to FLA Live Arena if it knows either Montour or Ekblad will be out.

Maurice said he doesn’t believe Montour’s injury is a long-term concern.

The good

▪ Tkachuk was once again the biggest bright spot for Florida. In his third game as a Panther, Tkachuk notched his fourth point and it was maybe his prettiest one yet, teeing up Bennett for an easy game-tying goal on a pinpoint backdoor feed in the second period.

The All-Star right wing wheeled around from behind the net to the top of the right faceoff circle and the Bruins (3-0-0) left him too much space to operate. Bennett charged to the net from the blue line and Tkachuk picked him out, threading a pass through four spread-out Boston defenders to give his center an easy tap-in goal on the left doorstep.

It was a new side of Tkachuk for Florida to see. Most of his production in the first two games of the season came right around the net, peppering goaltenders with close-range shots and wreaking havoc around the crease. This was a display of the skill the 24-year-old American possesses, too, and it’s why the Panthers have confidence he can fit with their wide-open, offensive-minded identity as well as he can augment it.

It wasn’t all finesse for Tkachuk, though. The star forward also got into a scrum with 9:34 left in the second period, going at Bruins center Tomas Nosek after he kneed winger Rudolfs Balcers in the neutral zone. Tkachuk now has two goals, two assists and six penalty minutes in three games with Florida.

▪ The ‘Comeback Cats’ almost popped up, too.

Forsling’s answer less than 30 seconds after Frederic put Boston up 4-1 gave the Panthers a shot and White cut the lead down to 4-3 with 1:37 left and the goaltender pulled.

For a team as shorthanded as Florida was, the effort is to be commended, even if it didn’t yield a third straight win.