At the beginning of the 21st century, Pavel Bure was clearly his club’s most important player in the NHL. “Florida” transferred to Russian Rocket in the winter of 1999 after his strike in “Vancouver”, caused by the breakdown of relations with the club’s management. In 223 games with the Panthers, Bure scored 152 goals and stood out among his star-studded surroundings. In the 2000/2001 season, Pavel scored 59 goals; the second sniper on that team that didn’t make the playoffs, Viktor Kozlov, only scored 14.
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After Bure left for Rangers, no one came close to the magic 50-goal mark, although there weren’t many contenders. Jonathan Huberdeau and Alexander Barkov, who for a long time personified the club’s entire attack, focused more on passing, although the Russian Finn more than once surpassed the 30-goal mark. Even on the ultra-offensive teams of previous seasons, no one did this, but it was done by a person who wasn’t talked about much before this season: Sam Rinehart.
Rinehart comes from a hockey family: his father played for Calgary and Vancouver and was named to Team Canada several times (including the 1981 Canada Cup, finishing 1-8 in the final). Both of Sam’s brothers were drafted: the middle one, Griffin, went fourth overall to the Islanders, but he turned out to be one of the biggest busts of the decade. However, Sam scored even higher. There was no clear No. 1 overall pick in the 2014 draft, and Rinehart was listed as one of the picks along with Aaron Ekblad and Sam Bennett. It’s interesting that all three now play for the same club – “Florida” seemed to make up for the fact that it only had one top-3 pick.
“Teams always need players who can make good decisions on the ice without the direction of a coach, and Rinehart demonstrated very mature play during his time in the youth league. “He knows how to play with the puck in every area of the ice, he has an incredible shot and is able to open up perfectly for these shots: all these qualities make him a candidate for the first pick in the draft,” some journalists wrote. . Others called him “the best playmaker in the draft” and compared him to Patrick Marleau in his style of play.
Sam Rinehart
Photo: Alan Schwartz/Zuma/TASS
Rinehart, perhaps, was not very lucky with the team: he was chosen by Buffalo, where at that time they carried out a complete restructuring and traded almost all normal players at the NHL level. However, they soon turned up: the Blades selected Jack Eichel in the following draft (although they wanted McDavid and almost threw a public tantrum after losing the draft lottery), and also traded Ryan O’Reilly from Colorado. The two centre-backs’ places were taken and Sam went to the flank, playing with one top striker and then the other.
Compared to how the best numbers of previous years broke into the league, Rinehart’s play in the first few seasons seemed modest (42 points in the first year, 47 in the next). In the context that the Europeans selected next, Draisaitl and Pastrnak, had already declared themselves out loud, some journalists have already begun to test with Sam the same status of draft failure as with his brother Griffin. “Would I pick Rinehart second overall right now? No,” wrote a National Post writer after Sam had a poor start to the 2017/2018 season. Against the backdrop of Edmonton’s early successes, impatient Buffalo fans also had high expectations for the young forwards.
At times the Rinehart-Eichel combination sounded, but that did not help the club’s success. The coaches, who often happened to be new to the managerial position of an NHL club, didn’t help either. Ralph Kruger, who made the Swiss national team a solid intermediary at the international level, slowed the development of the careers of several players in the club, including the first pick in the draft, Rasmus Dahlin. Rinehart was the club’s top scorer in the Covid-shortened season, but it was still less than fans expected. Rinehart himself also expected something different from the club, which was stuck in development.
“I need to take a break and then when the time comes we will decide everything. Nobody wants to go through perestroika. Especially considering that at the beginning of the season more or less [мне] He will be 26 years old. It’s difficult when you don’t play decisive matches,” the striker said in the spring of 2021, and could hardly have spoken more directly about his desire to change clubs. “Florida” gave Rinehart Devon Levy, who played brilliantly in the MFM, and a draft pick, with which they later chose another MFM star, Jiri Kulikh, but they did not regret this decision.
At that time, “Florida” organized a brilliant and deep attack: the location of the state, its zero taxes and the fact that the club did not accept interesting players at the peak of the price helped. The same story was repeated with another Buffalo newcomer, Brandon Montour, and Bennett, who arrived on the fourth line in Calgary. A little ceiling magic and an imbalance in lineup formation helped Florida create the fiercest attack in the entire league.
Under Paul Maurice, the team’s playing style also changed: in attack it became more aggressive, more focused on pressure and “dirty” goals. Here were two rookies from the 2014 draft with their own style, although the best player on last year’s team was undoubtedly Matthew Tkachuk. The NHL’s most stellar provocateur had a very mediocre start this season, and from the first games of the new championship, Rinehart began to replace him as the team’s main star in attack. Already in the first 15 games he scored 12 goals and then his productivity slightly decreased.
Sam Rinehart (right)
Photo: Charles Rex Arbogast/AP/TASS
We recently talked about the phenomenon of Zach Hyman, who also went from being a regular running back in Toronto to a 50-goal scorer. The year before, everyone was surprised by Chris Kreider, who scored 52 goals. These cases have something in common: many of these goals were scored from nickels, from setups, in general, they were “dirty” goals. Rinehart’s shooting map already says it all. Of course, most goals in hockey usually come from nickel, but the Florida forward also plays well on the finishing moves. Sam is tied for third in the NHL in goals after adjustments.
Pull map
However, there are two factors that can spoil these statistics. First of all, this is a contract year for Rinehart: he becomes an unrestricted free agent and in the context of such a season he could demand between 9 and 10 million dollars. In the NHL, players can easily be impressed after receiving a good contract. Jonathan Huberdeau. Second, Rinehart has an incredible 25% shooting percentage (with a career figure of 15%). However, experts believe that in this case it is not an accidental outbreak, but an indicator of the effective use of Rinehart by coaches and a consequence of Sam’s own game, which eliminates the best positions and moments for shooting. .
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Additionally, Florida is very satisfied with the forward’s performance without a puck and on defense. This season, Rinehart has become one of the team’s main short players, ranking in the top 10 in the league and scoring five 4-on-5 goals. Over the past nine championships, he… didn’t have those goals at all. “Sam is a fighter, a team player. There are guys who score 50 in a season and don’t play on their own field, but Rinehart is great in all aspects of the game. I’m glad he plays for us,” said Paul Maurice.
Florida itself, after instability at the beginning of the season, has recently become the most powerful NHL team. In terms of composition, the Panthers, who strengthened their defense in the summer, began to look even more powerful than last year. Then, for Rinehart comes the moment of truth in the cup: in the final against Vegas he only scored two points, scored 1:7, when his rival was almost celebrating the championship. It depends on whether Florida, pressed by the ceiling, will prefer to keep Sam for next year.
