With the 2025-26 NHL season quickly approaching, Brad Marchand and the Florida Panthers have all eyes on the prize. The mission is simple, but the climb is most definitely not. Now, the reigning Stanley Cup champions have announced a final decision on a former gold medal-winning teammate of Sam Reinhart.
Evan Cormier has been around the NHL for a while. Still, the veteran goaltender has yet to make his debut in the league. Selected with a fourth-round pick by the New Jersey Devils in 2016, the 27-year-old netminder hoped to get his chance with the Panthers.
However, as Marchand, Reinhart, and the back-to-back champs in Sunrise have the work cut out for them, the organization had other plans. Signed to a professional tryout contract, Cormier didn’t make the cut for Florida’s roster for the 2025-26 NHL season-opener.
“Goaltender Evan Cormier has been released from his professional tryout (PTO) and will report to the Charlotte Checkers,” as announced by the Panthers on NHL.com.
Evan Cormier #33 of the Florida Panthers celebrates with the Stanley Cup
What a difference a decade makes
Cormier and Reinhart go way back. Not only is Cormier in Florida’s system, and around the Panthers often. The two were a part of Team Canada’s gold-medal conquest during the 2015 IIHF World Junior Championship.
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Though Comrie played three games during the international tournament, he was benched in the Final, when Canada defeated Russia 5-4. In net for the Motherland, two household names saw minutes on the ice, Ilya Sorokin and Igor Shesterkin.
Meanwhile, Sam Reinhart finished the competition as the leading goal scorer (5) and tied for most points (11) along fellow Canadians, Connor McDavid and Nic Petan.
Connected
As in every edition of the annual under-18 tournament, the 2015 World Juniors were stacked with future superstars on every nation’s roster. At the end of the competition, another player who would go on to become a core member of the two-time Stanley Cup–winning Panthers made the tournament’s All-Star team: Gustav Forsling.
