Fort Lauderdale, Florida – striker AJ Greer will start in the Stanley Cup final for the Florida Panthers in match 3, said coach Paul Maurice on Monday.
Greer, 28, played for the last time in match 5 of the Eastern Conference final, where the Panthers eliminated the Hurricanes from Caroline. He missed the first two games against Edmonton’s Oilers with an undisclosed injury.
Greer has two goals and a decisive pass in 12 eliminatory games, forming a line of powerful energy with the attackers of the Panthers Jonah Gadjovich and Tomas Nosek. He is inspired by the winger Jesper Boqvist. Panthers have a 10-2 file when Greer is alignment in playoffs. The reigning champions are tied 1-1 with the Oilers in the final of the Stanley Cup.
“I really hated looking from top to top and not being with the guys and not being on the bench and not being able to play,” said Greer, who signed with the panthers as a free agent last summer. “But I had to make a decision that was going to be useful to the team. If I can’t be 100%, I don’t play in the right direction.”
Greer said he was not trying to do but play the role that the panthers need to play.
“I am not trying to change anything, and I do not try to change my identity. I just try to come back to the way I usually play with the two guys on this line and I just do what we do better, then set up the next line for success,” he said.
It was not always easy for Greer. He said that he had almost abandoned his NHL dream in 2021 when he was a member of the Islanders of Bridgeport in the AHL. Greer planned to go for Europe and continue his career there in search of more ice time and a more important role. In the end, he decided that the best way to become an NHL player was to accept to be a depth forward and play this role to the best of his abilities.
“I had to kiss the role of playing six minutes a night and being able to do the right things with this kind of minutes,” he said. “When I was younger, I was not used to this, and I was not mentally ready to accept this fact. I was always somehow played with this state of mind. I had to change what I thought and I really appreciate where I was.”
Match 3 of the Stanley Cup final is on Monday evening at sunrise.
