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The Florida Panthers will have to play the rest of Saturday night's game against the visiting Anaheim Ducks without sniper Sam Reinhart.
Reinhart was slapped with a five-minute major and a game misconduct after he caught Ducks forward Isac Lundestrom with a knee-on-knee hit late in the opening 20 minutes of play. Immediately, the incident caused a melee on the ice between the Panthers and Ducks, the latter of whom were stepping up in defense of their hurt teammate.
Because he was ejected from the game, Reinhart will automatically have the play reviewed by the NHL Department of Player Safety. He's never been suspended during his NHL career, and can't be considered a repeat offender.
Panthers forward Sam Reinhart re-signed with the team for eight seasons
One of the hottest commodities on the free-agent market, Reinhart instead decided to stay put and agreed to an eight-year contract extension to remain with the Panthers.
He scored the Stanley Cup-winning goal in Game 7 of the 2024 Stanley Cup Final against the Edmonton Oilers, and has every intention of running it back this season.
“It certainly hasn't changed for me this summer. Talking to the guys — we're certainly a close team that keeps in touch — but I don't think because we won, there's no satisfaction once that puck drops,” Reinhart said, via NHL.com. “So, [we were] as motivated as [we've] been this summer to put ourselves in another spot [to win]. Certainly it's not easy, but we feel like we've got a good group of guys still that are hungry for more.”
“Certainly there's things that work for us that we're going to try and replicate. But I think it starts with that competitiveness, that hunger to win. It's a feeling we want to chase again,” Reinhart said.
So far this season for the Panthers, Reinhart has scored 27 goals with 24 assists.
