It takes a lot to get Aleksander Barkov to curse and Matthew Tkachuk, on the eve of his first training camp with the Florida Panthers, nearly got his captain there Wednesday — sort of.
After wrapping up some precamp testing at the Florida Panthers IceDen, Barkov recalled the first text conversation he had with his new All-Star teammate after the Panthers’ blockbuster July trade brought him to South Florida.
“The first message,” Barkov said, with his usual sheepish smile, “is, Effing right.”
A little while later, Tkachuk laughed at the exchange. For Barkov, it was out of place — even if he didn’t actually use the word Tkachuk surely did. For Tkachuk, it was just more of the usual. The 24-year-old right wing is unabashedly himself — Barkov said he “pisses you off” when he’s on the other team and new coach Paul Maurice affectionately called him a “pain in the [expletive]” — and general manager Bill Zito decided in the summer it was exactly what the Panthers need to take the next step in their quest for a Stanley Cup.
On Thursday, they will get their first real glimpse at what he’ll bring to Florida when they kick off camp in Coral Springs.
“[Zito] was saying that we want a guy like you, we need a guy like you and I think it wasn’t just on ice he was talking about,” Tkachuk said. “I have a certain personality that’s a lot different than most people, and I think one of the main reasons that they brought me in was for the off-ice part and helping with the culture that they have built over the last few years.”
The first day of camp will mark exactly two months since the Panthers’ blockbuster trade rocked the NHL, sending All-Star left wing Jonathan Huberdeau and star defenseman MacKenzie Weegar to the Calgary Flames in exchange for Tkachuk. Florida was less than three months removed from winning its first Presidents’ Trophy, but also less than two months removed from getting swept out of the second round of the 2022 Stanley Cup playoffs by the Tampa Bay Lightning.
With Huberdeau and Weegar both entering the final years of their contracts, the Panthers decided they couldn’t just keep their core intact and hope they’d provide results. They had to be proactive, even if it meant parting with the top scorer in franchise history and one of the league’s most underrated defenders.
A prize like Tkachuk, they decided, was worth it.
“Management felt that it was a great way for us to change, evolve and be set up for years to come,” star defenseman Aaron Ekblad said. “I couldn’t agree more with it.”
At its most basic level, Florida is swapping Huberdeau — one of the best players in the league — for an arguably even better player, who’s also five years younger. Although Huberdeau topped Tkachuk in points last year, Tkachuk posted the third-best plus-minus in the 2021-22 NHL season and bested Huberdeau in point shares, according to Hockey-Reference.com, because of his superior defensive play.
This point, of course, is highly subjective. Their styles of play differ massively, after all — and this is the key to understanding the Panthers’ thought process. When Florida crashed out of the playoffs in May, the entire organization — players, management and even former interim coach Andrew Brunette — knew the Panthers couldn’t just keep playing the wide-open, free-wheeling style en route to 122 points in the regular season. Swapping Huberdeau and his league-leading 85 assists with Tkachuk will naturally cause a change.
“The players are the clear definers of how we play,” said Maurice, whom Florida hopes will help implement a more physical, old-school style. “Whatever they’re great at, that’s the style that you have to play. What Matthew does is changes options that we have in the style of play, so we would like to think that we’re much stronger in corners and within the three feet of the wall, which is where 85 percent of this game is played.”
His personality matches his play and whether it will rub off on everyone else ultimately doesn’t matter.
Maurice’s philosophy of letting players dictate the style of play means there still will be a big emphasis on the transition game — he called the Panthers’ neutral-zone play “almost unique” because of their speed and “chaos” they create for opponents — and he won’t try to make Barkov, always poised and seldom fiery, into someone he’s not.
Tkachuk’s star skill just happens to be the way he blends a elite-level talent with an agitator’s attitude.
“Ingredients are key. You have to have a bit of everything on your team. He brings a really unique ingredient,” Maurice said. “Idon’t like the word agitator with him because it undersells the quality of player that he is. He’s more than that. He’s just so darn involved in the play that if there’s a scrum there’s a pretty good chance he’s in the middle of it. That’s just the style of game he plays.
“What Bill is very astute at is, This is what we need more of.”
It was a hard truth for Florida and led him to a hard decision, yet even Barkov, who has never known life in the NHL without Huberdeau, has come to accept it.
“He’s an amazing guy, unbelievable guy,” Barkov said, “and exactly the guy we kind of needed here to get us to the next level.”
