Florida Panthers’ Easter Eggs

Happy Easter hockey fans! While many of you will find Easter baskets filled with chocolate and scratch off lottery tickets waiting for your this morning, we here at Panther Parkway decided to give you a new kind of Easter Egg. For this special holiday, we have put together a list of fun Florida Panthers’ Easter Eggs for you to enjoy. Everything from fun stats to interesting facts about the Panthers’ season are listed below, enjoy!

*Statistics shown are correct as of March 30, 2013.

• Between Stephen Weiss, Sean Bergenheim, Ed Jovanovski, Kris Versteeg, and Jose Theodore, the Panthers currently have $15,875,000 worth of salary out for the remainder of the 2013 season.

• The Florida Panthers are heading towards being the first Southeast Division champion to miss the playoffs the following year since the Atlanta Thrashers failed to reach the playoffs during the 2007-2008 season.

• Panthers’ rookie forward Drew Shore and Head Coach Kevin Dineen both played college hockey for the University of Denver.

• Forward George Parros needs just 21 PIM’s to reach 1000 for his career.

• After winning the Lady Byng Memorial Trophy with only 6 PIM’s last season, defenseman Brian Campbell already has 12 PIM’s this season.

• Brian Campbell is currently tied for 1st in the NHL with 6 powerplay goals by a defenseman this season.

• Forward Shawn Matthias earned Sportscenter’s “Top Play of the Night” with this goal against Winnipeg Jets. 

• Even though the Panthers average only 2.37 goals per game on average, they have scored 5 or more goals in 6 games this season.

• Rookie forward Jonathan Huberdeau currently leads all rookies in goals scored with 13.

• The Panthers have 7 prospects competing in this year’s 2013 NCAA Men’s D-I Hockey Tournament.

• Panthers’ prospect Corban Knight has been nominated for this year’s Hoby Baker Award, given annually to the best player in NCAA Men’s D-I Hockey.

• According to ESPN, the Panthers currently rank 23rd in NHL attendance - averaging 16,894 fans per game.

• The Panthers have already lost 181 man games due to injury this season - 232 if you count suspension/non-roster players.

• Forward Jonathan Huberdeau was named top rookie for the month of February.

• Forward Drew Shore led all NHL rookies in scoring during the month of February with 10 points (2G 8A).

• Forward Shawn Matthias has 14 goals in just 36 games this season. His previous high was 10 goals which he scored in 79 games played last season.

• Forward Shawn Matthias’ 11 goals during the month of March are the 2nd most goals scored in a single month in Panthers’ franchise history.

• Rookie Jonathan Huberdeau is 2 for 2 on penalty shots this season and 2 for 3 on shootout attempts.

• Defenseman Brian Campbell has logged over 30 minutes of ice time in 4 different games this season.

• With a +2 rating, forward Shawn Matthias is currently the only player on the Panthers’ roster with a positive plus/minus.

• Defenseman Tyson Strachan has been nominated for the a national sports philanthropy award for his work with abandoned dogs. 

• Forward Peter Mueller leads the Panthers in both shots (113) and takeaways (25).

• Amazingly, 10 of Jonathan Huberdeau’s 13 goals have come against Southeast Division opponents.

That was just a few interesting “Easter Eggs” from this season so far, so please feel free to share your own in the comments section below!

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