Every season, there are players who improve significantly upon their performances from the season prior. Even on a team as established, deep, and reliable as the Panthers, there will be injuries, surprises, and roster shuffling. Here, we’ll identify three players poised for upticks in offensive production. In doing so, we will also highlight the importance of the Panthers’ young players for next season and talk through their roster depth and construction.
Mackie Samoskevich – Continuing to Improve and Develop
Mackie Samoskevich was one of the players that was forgotten amidst the Panthers’ march to the Stanley Cup. He only played four playoff games, getting healthy-scratched in the others as head coach Paul Maurice went with a fourth line that had more size, grit, and experience.
However, Samoskevich had a great first full season in Florida and will be back for another after just recently signing a one-year contract extension worth $775,000. Samoskevich was the Panthers’ first-round pick in 2021 and is still just 22 years old. He has has a long way to go defensively before he can be relied on to play big playoff minutes, but he has an impressive offensive skill set nonetheless, with good speed and a dangerous shot. He accumulated an impressive 15 goals and 31 points last season in 72 games and was an asset on the power play with 11 power-play points.
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Given the dearth of young talent and prospects in Florida’s system and their aging roster, it will be important that Samoskevich continues to develop and improve. He should get ample opportunity to do so in the upcoming season, and hopefully that can translate into him being a more integral part of a playoff push.
Anton Lundell – Ready for a Bigger Role
Given how sound and reliable Anton Lundell is as a player and the fact that he has been a key playoff performer each of the last two seasons, it is easy to forget that he is still just 23 years old. Lundell was the Panthers’ first-round pick in 2020 at 12th overall.
Offensively, Lundell is still very much on the upswing. Last season he had a career-high 45 points to go along with an impressive 18 points in 23 playoff games. A deeper dive demonstrates that Lundell’s statistical capabilities are likely limited by his role on a deep and experienced Panthers team. In November of last season, a period when the Panthers were without several key player including Aleksander Barkov, Lundell accumulated five goals and 7 assists in just 11 games in 19:05 of average ice time, well above his 16:42 season average.
Lundell is in a similar — though obviously slightly better — position as Samoskevich. The Panthers are coming off two deep playoff runs and have an aging roster, with many key pieces either in their late prime or beyond. They will have to rely on their younger players to take on a significant offensive load during the regular season to ensure that they are healthy and deep come playoff time. Lundell should be in a great position to build upon his success from last season.
Carter Verhaeghe – Primed for a Bounce-Back Season
Carter Verhaeghe does not fit the theme as Lundell and Samoskevich do of young, developing players who will need to be relied upon given the age and games played of this Panthers roster. Verhaeghe, at 29 years old, is on this list because he was, in many ways, quite unlucky last season. In the regular season, his numbers took a massive downturn, accumulating just 20 goals and 53 points and a minus-14 rating in 81 games after coming off two-consecutive seasons above 30 goals and 70 points.
With that said, all signs point to the fact that last season was more of an anomaly than a trend and that Verhaeghe should be back in the 60-70 point range this season. For one, he had a career-worst 8.3 shooting percentage, well below his career average of 13.4%. Second, he had a resurgent postseason, tying for first among all Panthers with 23 points in 23 games played. Finally, Verhaeghe is still in his prime and showed no signs of physical decline; he looked fast and strong.
This Will Be a Strange Regular Season for the Panthers
Coming off a second-consecutive Stanley Cup, there is little motivation for the Panthers to go all out in the 2025-26 regular season. They are a near-lock for a postseason berth, and they know that once they get there, regardless of whether they have home-ice advantage, they have what it takes to win.
With that said, it is impossible to be on cruise control for the entirety of the season. There is simply too much unpredictability and upheaval in hockey. As a result, one logical plan of attack is for the Panthers to rely on the three players listed above to produce more than they did last regular season. If they do, it will allow them to take a bit of a load off of some of their older veteran players.
Finally, it is worth noting that the Panthers have several injury question marks that will be points of emphasis this season: Matthew Tkachuk’s torn adductor may require surgery, Barkov has not played more than 73 games in any of the last six seasons, and several players are getting older and entering the back half of their careers.
