Matthew Tkachuk didn't sugarcoat it last night. Losing Aleksander Barkov mid-game in San Jose was awful, and the Florida Panthers still clawed out a point.
Tkachuk was asked about losing his captain after Thursday's 4-3 overtime loss to the San Jose Sharks. His answer was blunt: "Obviously that was awful."
Barkov is now listed as day-to-day with a leg injury. He logged just 9:15 of ice time before his night ended early.
Florida's No. 19 kept going. "We could have gone one or two ways and felt, you know, bad for ourselves and mailed it in," he said.
The Panthers didn't. Tkachuk pointed straight at the third period and called it "a gritty point that we got."
You can see the interview here.
He has a case. Eetu Luostarinen scored twice, one of them on the power play, and Florida dragged a game without its captain past regulation.
Akira Schmid stopped 28 of 32 shots. Not spotless. Enough to bank a point on the road, though.
Gustav Forsling's absence leaves Florida thin heading to Anaheim
Here's what should worry Paul Maurice more than the scoreboard. Forsling did not dress Thursday and is expected out until at least October 4.
That's Sunday, when the Panthers visit the Anaheim Ducks. The defenseman scored the overtime winner in the 1-0 opener at Carolina, so Florida is missing a guy who already decided a game.
The back end without him on a California road swing that still runs through Los Angeles on Tuesday? Thinner than anyone in that locker room wants.
San Jose's kids did the damage. Will Smith scored twice, once on the power play and once shorthanded, while Macklin Celebrini set up three goals.
Celebrini also fired seven shots on goal. Luca Cagnoni ended it in overtime, and Yaroslav Askarov turned aside 23 of 26 at the other end.
The two teams don't meet again until February 21 in Florida. The Sharks will remember this one fondly.
Florida's top forward described "a lot of stuff going on that normally you don't see." Brady Tkachuk went minus-2 and took five penalty minutes in the middle of it.
Still, he called it "good intense game." Fair enough. Losing locker rooms always find the silver lining faster when nobody knows the captain's status yet.
The bigger problem is offense. Florida has scored four goals through two games, and losing Barkov from that equation is like a restaurant losing its head chef during the Saturday rush.
The kitchen keeps plating. Nobody in the dining room is fooled for long.
So treat day-to-day as a warning, not good news. A $10,000,000 cap hit with no points yet is still the player this lineup bends around.
The Panthers sit first in their division for now. That cushion means very little in October.
Sunday in Anaheim will say plenty. If the captain is in street clothes, who absorbs the minutes he leaves behind?
Should the Panthers sit Aleksander Barkov in Anaheim even if he's cleared to play?
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Brady Tkachuk cheap-shots Macklin Celebrini then gets rocked by Jacob Trouba
