Aaron Ekblad Will Have Shoulder Surgery

For the second straight day, the Florida Panthers announced a member of their defense corps will undergo shoulder surgery. Aaron Ekblad will have a procedure done after sustaining two separate shoulder dislocations during the team’s playoff run, he told reporters including Tim Reynolds of the Associated Press today.

Ekblad’s recovery time will stretch into next season’s training camp. It’s unclear whether he’ll be ready for the start of the 2023-24 regular season.

One of his shoulder dislocations occurred during the Eastern Conference Final, Ekblad said. He didn’t register a point at even strength in the team’s four-game sweep of the Carolina Hurricanes and averaged 21 minutes per game – not including Game 1’s four-overtime win.

As head coach Paul Maurice said yesterday, Ekblad broke his foot during Game 2 of the team’s first-round win against the Boston Bruins. Ekblad said today he didn’t find out about the injury until the downtime between the second and third rounds.

That second-round series on a broken foot against the Toronto Maple Leafs was Ekblad’s best of the postseason. The 27-year-old defender clicked at a point per game against Toronto after failing to get on the scoresheet in six games against the Bruins.

Maurice added more clarity to Florida’s injury report today, too, saying forward Eetu Luostarinen’s absence in the Stanley Cup Final was due to a broken tibia sustained in the series-clinching Game 4 of the Eastern Conference Final. Unlike Ekblad and Brandon Montour, Luostarinen will not require off-season surgery.

Luostarinen skated multiple times during Panthers practices after the injury and attempted to return. The 2017 second-round pick of the Hurricanes had a breakout season for Florida in 2022-23, averaging nearly 16 minutes per game in the regular season and scoring 17 goals and 43 points while playing in all 82 games. He added five points in 16 playoff games while seeing an uptick in ice time.