The Florida Panthers dreams of ending the franchises’ playoff drought will be played out in the next month on the ice as they face arguably the toughest stretch of their schedule all season. Beginning with tonights game against the Montreal Canadiens, the Panthers begin a stretch run in which 10 of the 15 games they play will be against teams in the top 5 from both the Eastern and Western conference.

The Panthers currently hold the 8th and final spot in the Eastern conference with 52 pts. Division rival Carolina however is nipping at their heels with 51pts. To say the Panthers can ill afford to lose in the coming weeks would be stretch it, they have another 20 games after this stretch and the opponents during that time are not as tough night in and night out as those the Panthers will face in the immediate future. Nonetheless, the Panthers need to come out of this 15 game stretch in good shape, collecting as many points as possible, so they don’t leave it until the end of the season and force themselves into win or go home situations against teams with nothing to lose.

During the coming weeks Florida will face (in no particular order) the current #1 in the East Boston Bruins twice, #2 Washington twice, #3 New Jersey twice, #4 New York (Rangers) twice, and #5 Montreal once. In addition, they have one game against #10 Carolina (who sit 1pt behind Florida) and one against the #4 team in the West, the Chicago Blackhawks. Even the “easier” games, two against Toronto and two against the New York Islanders, won’t necessarily be gimmes. Toronto is 11pts out of the playoffs, a margin not impossible to make up, so they will be fighting hard. The Islanders have no hope of making the playoffs, and while the Panthers are 2-1 against them this season, the loss came at New York in ugly fashion.

The Panthers are going to have to be on their “A” game in the coming weeks. Perfection is not necessary during this stretch, instead they should look at it more from a “points” stand point. Florida needs to pick up points anyway they can and be glad to do so, even if it means overtime losses. They can’t afford mental let downs because they have a less than sharp performance one night. On top of a grueling schedule opponent wise, the Panthers will get more than 1 night off only 3 times, and even then it is just 2 days to accommodate travel. Hopefully at the end of February things will look as bright for the Panthers as they do right now.