Dave Hyde: On the brink of 50 goals, Sam Reinhart shows why Panthers are primed this season
FORT LAUDERDALE — Some talents aren’t taught. Some are just appreciated. Sam Reinhart is on the doorstep to a neon number for the Florida Panthers: 50 goals. Maybe the best way to understand what’s at work is through a family story from a youth hockey camp his dad, Paul, worked.
Paul Reinhart was an All-Star defenseman in the 1980s, a Team Canada mainstay, the kind of defensive quarterback NHL teams covet. Years after retiring, he was helping at a former teammate’s camp in Whistler, British Columbia, when his youngest son stepped in for a faceoff drill.
“As soon as the puck dropped, he didn’t not only do the right thing with his stick but was exceptional with his body position,’’ Paul Reinhart said. “I watched that and said, ‘Sam, there’s not much I’m going to be able to teach you about hockey that you don’t already know.’ ”
Sam was 10 then and maybe dreamed of this season he’s having at 28. His team is a Stanley Cup contender and his two goals in a rare Panthers’ loss to Tampa Bay on Saturday gave him 48 on the season.
Only Pavel Bure has hit that number with the Panthers. Only Toronto’s Auston Matthews has more in the league this year. Reinhart scored 33 and 31 goals, both career highs, his previous two Panthers seasons. So, even for a goal scorer, as he’s always been, this is a rare season.
Reinhart offers the idea he might be “quicker” on the ice this year as a reason for his scoring. Panthers coach Paul Maurice adds that after two mystifying seasons in which Reinhart and center Aleksander Barkov didn’t produce, and were split up, their high-end talents clicked this year.
“The best work he’s done in his career that I’ve seen has been with an elite center, where he’s made the center better by going exactly to where he wants him,’’ said Kyle Okposo, a Panthers newcomer who not only played for five years with Reinhart in Buffalo but was in his wedding. “He’s just always in the right spot. He was for Jack Eichel (in Buffalo). His chemistry with (Barkov) has been phenomenal all year.
“He’s such a smart player, obviously, as you see on power plays where he plays the middle that a lot of guys don’t like. But you can get a lot of goals there if you’re smart, and he’ll just meander there for 45 seconds looking for the right spot.”
Throw into the mix he doesn’t need to play with the puck and you’re getting closer to the ingredients of his season’s success.
“He will carry the puck if it’s the appropriate play, but he doesn’t need to,’’ Okposo said. “Some guys have to carry it, but he can one-touch it for an entire game and finish with a goal and two assists.”
Reinhart is a top example — a top-line player having a career season — of why the Panthers might have no better chance at winning it all than this year. He’s also in the last year of his contract, as is defenseman Brandon Montour, showing the Panthers have some looming decisions in a salary-capped sport.
Reinhart has, in some form, been playing on a top line since birth. He came home from the hospital, and the family joke is he was set in a playroom where his older brothers, Max and Griffin, shot tennis balls at him in a car seat.
The Reinhart brothers grew up in Vancouver playing a blend of sports: tennis, golf, soccer, lacrosse and, of course, hockey. All three were drafted in the NHL, even if that wasn’t the big-picture plan of parents Paul and Theresa.
“We brought them up to be well-rounded and athletic,’’ dad said. “They were best friends, played constantly all those sports together, and 99 percent of the success goes to them for the work they put in.”
Even now, as if to show his overall sports education, Sam remains a soccer fan. It started with Barcelona and Lionel Messi. Now he’s attended some Inter Miami games to see Messi.
“Big fan,’’ he said.
Paul Reinhart, watching from afar, enjoys watching his son land in a winning place. The Panthers have traits that remind him of the dynastic New York Islanders in the 1980s in that, “they’re physical, hard to play against, with great depth on the third and fourth lines and also great talent,’’ Paul Reinhart said.
His son is part of that top talent as the production shows.
“I think they have several guys who are all at the stage of their career where they’d be more than happy to give back some of their individual success to collect the team prize,’’ Paul Reinhart said. “That’s how they’re playing, how it looks like they come to the rink every day.”
Sam, asked what scoring 50 goals would mean, says: “It’s a cool number, but I don’t think ahead about it. I’m more of a day-to-day guy.”
Today, in other words, isn’t being on the brink of 50 goals. Maybe no day is spent thinking that. But today’s about the last breath of down time before Thursday’s game against Nashville starts a scheduling rush to the playoffs..
