Connor Ingram is Florida-bound!

Miami, 19-02-2024

We were following the action closely in Florida as we were hearing that GM PKayne was aggressively working the phones to try to get a deal done. Following a 4th loss in a row for the Panthers on Saturday, the league approved a trade where the Panthers were acquiring goalie Connor Ingram in exchange of prospect Koehn Ziemmer, a 4th a 6th round pick in the upcoming draft.

Carter Hart did really well as of now this season (except maybe for the past couple of games) just like his record (26-15-3), his save percentage (.926) and his GAA (1.97) are showing. Sam Montembeault did some great work too and he has some decent stats but his 4-4-3 record was probably not good enough to be comfortable with moving forward.

So we’ll probably witness a “ménage à trois” until the end of the season where the best of these 3 could be the starter in the playoffs, even if Carter Hart is definitely ahead as of right now. Once the deal was made official by the league, we’ve reached to GM PKayne to gather some comments and here’s what he had to say:

“We’re extremely pleased to welcome Connor (Ingram) to the organization. Just like many goaltenders these days, he’s one of those goalies who were promising at a young age but reached another level as he gained some maturity. He’s now 26 years old and is a very capable starter in this league. On top of that, he comes with a 1,950,000$ AAV for this season and two more so it’s a huge plus for our soon-to-be capstrap team. Of course, having 3 young talented goalies could become a problem but for now, it’s a great problem to have. Carter, Sam and Connor are mature and smart hockey players, they understand the business and I’m sure they’ll do what they gotta do to help the team get some W’s.”

And then, I asked him about what he had to pay to acquire Ingram and what the market looks like these days and here’s what he said: “It’s never a great moment to part with a talented young prospect and great young man like Koehn (Ziemmer). He did everything he had to do since he got drafted here but he also understands it’s a business and I’m sure they’ll take care of him in Calgary. We’re in win-now mode here and the Flames are definitely rebuilding so I think it was a win-win transaction. Ziemmer will probably be able to compete for a spot on the team faster than he would have here. As for the market, well, you have to pay something good to get something good, that’s how it always works!”

As someone who’s been following this team closely for 12 or 13 seasons now, I’m totally sure that PKayne isn’t done adding to his team. The trade deadline is in less than 3 weeks and the Panthers are in a good position to make the playoffs so they’ll be buyers for sure. PKayne’s known for being a proactive GM and I think we’ll see that again in the next weeks or so.

Stay tuned folks!

Mark Kandy
Miami Sun