FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — Perhaps the best words that Florida Panthers coach Paul Maurice has ever heard in the situation he and his team now find themselves in — a must-win game, though not in that case, a Game 7 — came all the way back, back when Maurice was coaching in juniors, for the Memorial Cup.
“He said, ‘Fellows, we’ve got to win tonight because this is probably going to be a bunch our’s last game of organized hockey,'” Maurice recalled. “I thought that was an awesome line. Oh, man. And it was, right? You play major junior, there’s a bunch of 19-year-old guys that aren’t going to turn pro and that was it, that was their last game. I thought that was pretty good. They didn’t win, though.”
It’s been decades since that…