Bennett's Deal Is Done — Can the Panthers Lock In Ekblad and Marchand Next?

The Florida Panthers, fresh off winning a second consecutive Stanley Cup, took care of their first major order of offseason business Friday when Sam Bennett agreed to an eight-year contract extension .

Now, can they do the same with defenseman Aaron Ekblad and forward Brad Marchand before free agency begins on Tuesday? That's the priority.

"My preference - and maybe I'm hoping - is that there's enough for guys to want to stay to be a part of this and be treated fairly and be happy," Panthers president of hockey operations and general manager Bill Zito said Saturday. "That's the most important thing."

Bennett was the first of the three Zito and the Panthers were able to finalize. The second-line center's deal has an average annual value of $8 million. That cuts Florida's remaining cap space to $11 million. That'll be a tight squeeze to fit Ekblad, Marchand and the salaries for a pair of restricted free agents in forward Mackie Samoskevich and backup goaltender Daniil Tarasov.

" We've been discussing all of them," Zito said of potential deals for Marchand and Ekblad now that the Bennett deal is done. "Everything is so intertwined. When you spend to the cap and you do it for as many years as we have and commit to as many guys as we have, the wiggle room on little things is really, really difficult. Sometimes you just have to keep at it so that you can fit everybody and keep the team and the core of the team together."

Zito, for his part, has done an admiral job of getting the Panthers' core signed long-term. Eight Panthers players are under contract through at least the 2029-30 season .

▪ Forwards Aleksander Barkov ($10 million AAV), Matthew Tkachuk ($9.5 million AAV) and Anton Lundell ($5 million AAV) plus defenseman Seth Jones ($7 million AAV) are signed for the next five years.

▪ Forward Sam Reinhart ($8.63 million AAV) and defenseman Gustav Forsling ($5.75 million AAV) are signed for another seven years, through 2031-32.

▪ Forwards Carter Verhaeghe ($7 million AAV) and Bennett ($8 million) are inked through the 2032-33 season.

"Obviously, people talk about these players who stay, and the guys who stay generally take discounts," Zito said. "Look at our roster and then ask what they could be making other places. It's because they want to be part of it, and they understand it's not a financial decision to take less. Somebody asked me if I was negotiating. No. I'm mediating because we're spending it all. We're trying to get everybody happy and then if guys want to be here, we want to treat you as fairly as we can so that we can stay and we can keep the team together, because teams win."

Bennett easily fits into that category . He won the Conn Smythe Trophy as MVP of the Stanley Cup playoffs after leading the league with 15 goals - including an NHL-record 13 road goals - this postseason. That came after setting a career-high with 51 points (25 goals, 26 assists) in the regular season and winning a gold medal with Team Canada during the 4 Nations Face-Off. There was speculation that he could have made north of $10 million per year if he tested free agency.

But he chose to stay in Florida, where his career has taken off after being acquired at the trade deadline in 2021.

Why?

"This is the core that's been here for the last three, four years," Bennett said Saturday. "We've had so much success, I don't see why we can't continue it. I think we're all so committed to the same goal of winning and doing whatever it takes, putting in the hard hours to do what it takes to win. This is the core that I want to be with."

Ekblad, who has played for the Panthers his entire career and is coming off an eight-year deal that had a $7.5 million annual cap hit, has said he wants to stay, too. The defenseman has been with the Panthers his entire career since Florida took him No. 1 overall in 2014. His 732 career regular-season games played for the organization are second behind only Barkov. Ekblad also holds the franchise's defenseman records for games played (732), goals (118), assists (262) and points (380).

"That's part of who I am at this point," Ekblad said on June 21, the day before the team's championship parade. "I've spent 11 years here, and that's more than I've spent in any home or city in my life. It's home, and I expect it to be home."

Marchand, who Florida acquired as a rental at the trade deadline and whose previous deal had an annual cap hit of $6.125 million, looked like a natural fit with the team during his three-and-a-half months here.

On the ice, he logged 20 points (10 goals, 10 assists) in the playoffs, including six goals in the Stanley Cup Final, and elevated Florida's third line with Lundell and winger Eetu Luostarinen.

Off the ice, he became a central figure in the dressing room with teammates who had been enemies over the past two years. He introduced himself to the team group chat with a flurry of chirps. He became the center of the postgame celebration as the team flung rubber rats at him as they left the ice. He was the leader of Dairy Queen trips on the road during the final two rounds of the playoffs.

"We'll see what happens here soon," Marchand said after the Panthers clinched the Stanley Cup.