Panthers bites...

A quick little update on the recent goings-ons of the Florida Panthers.

The Panthers signed their first pick (10th overall) of the 2007 draft, 19 year old defenseman Keaton Ellerby. Despite standing 6'4", he weighs in at only 188 lbs. Granted, he's 19. A year or 2 and Ellerby could develop into and intimidating force on the Panthers blueline. He spent last season playing for the Moose Jaw Warriors of the Western Hockey League, where he played in 53 games, scored 2 goals, an impressive 21 assists, and logged 81 penalty minutes.

In the IIHF World Championships, the quarterfinal matchups are set, and 4 of the 8 teams remaining have Panther representation.

David Booth and Craig Anderson will be playing for Team USA as they take on Olli Jokinen and Ville Peltonen and Team Finland for the 2nd time in 4 days. The last meeting between the 2 teams was a thrilling, albeit controversial and violent game. Jokinen drew a match penalty late in the 1st period for checking American Tim Gleason from behind. The first Finnish goal came from Ville Koistinen, and appeared to actually go under the side of the net. Upon further review, the referrees deemed it was a good goal. Since then, however, the IIHF revealed after the game that Koistinen's shot had, indeed, entered the side of the net and should not have counted, and the video-goal judge will not be working for the rest of the tournament. The game ended with a minor melee, including a fight between David Backes and Anssi Salmela, who was bloodied. Both players received match penalties. No word yet on whether any suspensions from that game will carry over to tomorrow's quarterfinal matchup. Oh yea, Finland won the game, 3-2.

While Booth and Anderson have been largely absent from the American score sheet, Jokinen and Peltonen lead their team's offensive threats. In the Fins defeat of Lativa a few days earlier, the two Panthers combined for 20 shots and over 41 minutes of ice time.

Also tomorrow, Magnus Johansson and Sweden will play the Czech Republic. Johansson has been a solid presence for the Swedes, and has often been one of the leading ice-time getters.

Jay Bouwmeester and Canada will play Norway. Bouwmeester, like Johansson, has been seeing plenty of ice time on his team's top defensive pairing.

So be sure to tune your computers to www.wcsn.com tomorrow night to check out what's sure to be a great night of hockey.