Former top pick Samoskevich sets big goal for Year 1 as pro: ‘Play down here’ for Florida
Mackie Samoskevich won’t turn 21 until November and yet it’s hard for him to find a chance to slow down.
His second and final season at Michigan ended in April in the Frozen Four and he went just about straight from Tampa to North Carolina to join AHL Charlotte less than two weeks later, and then he was in the 2023 Calder Cup playoffs just a few days after beginning his professional career. Even after the Charlotte Checkers lost in Round 2, Samoskevich wasn’t done: He headed straight to Coral Springs to work among the Florida Panthers’ vast array of reserve options during their run through the 2023 Stanley Cup playoffs.
In all, the 20-year-old center’s season ran for nearly nine months and, less than a month after the Panthers lost the 2023 Stanley Cup playoff in June, he was already back to work this week at the Florida Panthers IceDen for Florida’s annual development camp with one massive objective on his mind.
“I’d love to play down here. I think that’s the main goal,” Samoskevich said Monday. “I don’t think it’s far-fetched, I know I can do it, I think I can play in the big leagues.”
Mackie Samoskevich ends it 52 secs into OT, Michigan goes to the Frozen Four pic.twitter.com/lVMU4rfg6z
— CJ Fogler account may or may not be notable (@cjzero) March 27, 2023
His brief stint in the American Hockey League last year, all of which was played on just a try-out contract, provided a glimpse of what he might be able to bring to the Panthers. He finished the regular season with two assists in two games and then handed out four more in seven postseason games, leading all Checkers forwards with 19 shots.
It came right on the heels of a breakout season for the Wolverines, too. After playing a complementary role and earning all-freshman honors in the Big Ten Conference on a stacked team as a freshman, Samoskevich stepped into a leading role as a sophomore, scored 19 goals and had 21 assists in 41 games, and earned second-team All-Big Ten recognition.
It was exactly what Florida hoped for from its most recent first-round pick.
“What I like about Mackie is he understands an honest evaluation of the play,” said Charlotte coach Geordie Kinnear, who runs the development camp. “When he didn’t have a good game, I’d call him into my office and I’d say, ‘What do you think of your game?’ I wouldn’t tell him what I thought and he said, ‘I wasn’t very good.’ I said, ‘Well, everyone’s going to have a game like that, so next game go out and be better.’
“You need that from players, to give an honest evaluation of their own play, and, as a coach, it makes it easy, but he came in and was a great player for us. ... His growth, from when I first saw him to now, is awesome.”
Samoskevich, who was the No. 24 pick in the 2021 NHL Entry Draft, is the Panthers’ next best chance at finding a star from their farm system. The American forward is their only prospect ranked in the top 50 among drafted players, according to TheHockeyWriters.com, and is on track to be their last first-round pick until at least 2025 because of how many they traded away to chase Stanley Cups. Bill Zito excels at finding valuable pieces in unlikely places, but Samoskevich’s ceiling is higher than it is for most of the hidden gems the general manager uncovers.
There is also an opening for him to help out Florida this year. The Panthers lost both Colin White and Eric Staal in free agency — the centers both remain free agents, but Florida, at this point, appears unlikely to re-sign them — and replaced them with two low-cost, defensive-minded forwards on one-year deals.
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Samoskevich — along with left wing Grigori Denisenko, who was also a first-round pick and re-signed with the Panthers on a two-year, $1.55 million deal July 1 — is both Florida’s best option if it wants to round out the roster with a high-upside option and one of the next men up if anyone else gets hurt.
Barring a surprise, Samoskevich will begin next season in Charlotte, still a step away from his ultimate goal, but only one step away with a chance to get better.
“The progress here that I can make with the coaching staff and other players that are here is just top notch,” Samoskevich said. “I know I’m a good player, and not letting myself get too high on the good days and two low on the bad days is the biggest thing.”
