Panthers Place Forward Matthew Tkachuk on LTIR

One day after acquiring five-time All-Star defenseman Seth Jones in a blockbuster trade from the Chicago Blackhawks, the Florida Panthers made another move on Sunday.

The Panthers placed star forward Matthew Tkachuk on the long-term injured reserve list (LTIR), according to Puckpedia.

Tkachuk hasn’t played since he sustained an apparent groin injury while playing at the 4 Nations Face-Off with Team USA last month.

Panthers head coach Paul Maurice said last week the 27-year-old would play for the team again this season.

In 52 games this season, Tkachuk was scoring at over a point-per-game rate, with 22 goals, 35 assists for 57 points.

The Panthers have $8,705,000 of cap space to work with now that they’ve placed Tkachuk — who has a cap hit of $9.5M — on LTIR. Before a player can return from LTIR, they must miss at least 10 games and be out for 24 days.

A player can be placed on LTIR retroactive to the last game they played — Tkachuk has been out since Feb 22, making the first game he’s eligible to return on March 20.

After trading goaltender Spencer Knight to the Blackhawks on Saturday for Jones, the Panthers dipped into the LTIR pool to call up goaltender Chris Driedger, who has a cap hit of $795k, from the Charlotte Checkers (AHL).

Driedger will serve as backup to Sergei Bobrovsky.

If the Panthers choose to spend more of the LTIR funds before the NHL trade deadline on March 7, it would make it highly unlikely for Tkachuk to return before the end of the regular season — barring another huge trade to clear money — as they’d need to be cap compliant.