Sam Reinhart will not play for the Florida Panthers in Game 3 of the Eastern Conference finals against Carolina on Saturday night because of a left knee injury, one that happened Thursday night when he was skated into by the Hurricanes' Sebastian Aho.
The Panthers are listing him as day to day.
It's a significant blow to the Panthers, who lead the series 2-0. Reinhart scored the winning goal in Game 7 of last season's Stanley Cup Final for the Panthers, the capper of a 67-goal season including playoffs, and has more goals - by far - than anyone else on the Florida roster since joining the club four years ago.
"It's a significant player out of our lineup, for sure," Panthers coach Paul Maurice said. "We have gone through other significant ones ... you have to be able to survive. You have to have one guy go down and still have a chance - or you don't have the depth that you think you have."
Reinhart's 43 goals this season, including playoffs, leads the team. He has 185 goals, again including playoffs, since joining the team - 36 more than Carter Verhaeghe, 61 more than Aleksander Barkov, 74 more than Sam Bennett and 76 more than Matthew Tkachuk.