Youth certainly wasn’t served in Florida on Friday, as the Panthers cut a number of promising prospects from their training camp roster.
Drew Shore, Quinton Howden, Vincent Trocheck, Alex Petrovic, Rocco Grimaldi and Mackenzie Weegar were all send to AHL San Antonio, GM Dale Tallon confirmed.
“All of these players competed very hard over the last two weeks and had excellent training camps,” Tallon said in a statement. “They are all young and talented players who will be a big part of our organization moving forward. We are very confident that they will help us win now and in the future.”
The most notable of the cuts might be Shore, who’s appeared in 67 games for the Panthers over the last two years. Shore, 23, was the 44th overall pick at the 2009 NHL Entry Draft and has already established himself as a solid scorer at the AHL level, notching 62 points in 91 games over the last two years combined.
Howden, Trocheck and Petrovic are also noteworthy cuts (all have made their Panthers debuts, each appearing in at least 13 contests). Howden, the 25th overall pick in 2010, had a nice stint with the Panthers last year by scoring four goals and six points in 16 games; Trocheck had eight points in 20 contests while Petrovic, a defenseman, has made appearances for Florida in each of the last two seasons.
With today’s cuts the Panthers are now down to 24 players on the active roster, which includes ’14 No. 1 overall pick Aaron Ekblad.
