It’s hard to find a key shift when Aaron Ekblad is not on the ice.
The Florida Panthers defenseman, now in his seventh NHL season, is honing in on his all-around game, and his presence has been well noticed through the Panthers’ franchise-record 5-0-1 start to the season.
And while most of the new guys — the Carter Verhaeghes, Anthony Duclairs and Patric Hornqvists of the roster — are getting the bulk of the attention, it’s hard to downplay Ekblad’s contributions early this year.
The simplest evidence: The sheer amount of time he’s on the ice each game.
Heading into Tuesday’s set of games, Ekblad is sixth in the NHL in average ice time per game (25:49) and one of just eight players averaging more than 25 minutes per game. That’s nothing unusual for Ekblad. He has been the Panthers’ leader in average ice time each of the past two seasons and was second the four years prior to that.
“He’s playing important minutes, matchup minutes late in games,” coach Joel Quenneville said. “We’ve had a lot of games on the line here, five in a row. Those are a lot of big minutes and important minutes. He’s meeting the challenge.”
The 24-year-old is coming off the best season of his career, setting personal-best marks with 41 points and 35 assists through 67 games. He has had steady production so far this year, scoring two goals and recording three assists through six games.
He’s on the top defensive pairing with MacKenzie Weegar for a second consecutive year. The duo was stellar last season, with the Panthers scoring nine more goals than they let up in 5-on-5 situations when Ekblad and Weegar were on the ice together (33 goals for, 24 goals against).
“I think we left off right where we were,” Weegar said. “We’ve been playing solid. Ek’s consistent every year. Every game, he’s been playing well and he’s fun to play with. I just try to pick up off him.”
He’s finally cracked the top power-play unit, deployed as a winger alongside forwards Aleksander Barkov, Jonathan Huberdeau and Patric Hornqvist as well as fellow defenseman Keith Yandle.
That top power-play unit has already scored seven goals in six games with all five players scoring at least one goal. Ekblad has been involved in three of the seven goals, scoring on a one-timer in Sunday’s 3-2 win over the Red Wings and adding a pair of primary assists.
“It’s a little bit different playing on that flank on the power play,” Ekblad said, “but I love it. It’s it’s a fun place to be and you get to handle the puck especially if you get a power play early in the game, it helps to handle the puck and that situation kind of sets you up to be a little bit more patient with it throughout the rest of the game. I love it. I’m happy with the way things are going and just gonna try and build on it and continue building on my defensive game.”
And, for good measure, Ekblad is playing a vital role on the Panthers’ penalty kill unit, averaging 3:02 of ice time per game while the team is shorthanded. That’s the most among Florida defensemen and only trails forwards Noel Acciari (3:45) and Alex Wennberg (3:21).
“It’s a comfortability aspect,” Ekblad said. “Obviously the more experience you have in certain situations, things come a little bit more naturally and it’s muscle memory. ... I’m happy with the way things are going. Just going to try to continue to build on it.”
