It’s already well noted how injury plagued the Florida Panthers were this past season. One guy who found himself in the middle of said “plague” was center Aleksander Barkov. Originally sidelined in late December with an undisclosed injury, he would miss 15 games on an IR stint and collectively miss 21 games on the season.
We’ve never seen what Barkov is capable of in a full season, because he hasn’t played a full 82 game season before. What’s impressive is the numbers he’s put up in the last two seasons that were cut short (49 goals, 62 assists to be exact).
With his great two-way play, deadly shot, finishing abilities and vision with the puck. Theres no doubt that Barky will be an elite player in this league for a long time. When talking about him you also can’t go without mentioning his highlight reel shootout moves.
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In his first season with the team (2013-14) he missed some time with a knee injury, sustained in an Olympic match up against Norway. Following his return, another knee injury would sideline him and he would only play 54 games that season putting up 8 goals and 16 assists.
Barkov also missed significant time in 2015-16 after taking a shot to the wrist against the Chicago Blackhawks that October. He would take a high hit from Justin Adbelkader that February which sat him for a few weeks as well. All in all he’d play in 66 games and still lead the team in goals with 28 and 31 assists.
Lastly of course, we have the mysterious back injury of this season that we still don’t know much about. That saw him miss the majority of his time (15 games) this season and he was also out for the last six games of the season.
One thing Barkov has consistently done is recover from injury and bounce back even better. If that’s a sign of things to come I believe he’s poised for a big year, granted if he could stay healthy the 30 goal mark will not be far away for him.
When playing, he’s made himself known as one of the best two-way centers in the game. Being compared to the likes of Anze Kopitar and Henrik Zetterberg. What’s better than being amongst elite company?
Well I wouldn’t know personally, but Barkov being about 10 years younger than them is definitely a huge plus.
I hope this upcoming season we all can see Barky log his first 82 game (and hopefully all star) bid of his career. It would be a huge step for the young center and great for the team that misses him dearly when out of the lineup.