J.T. Miller only wanted to talk hockey on Thursday morning.
The centre will make his return to the Vancouver Canucks' lineup against the Florida Panthers on Thursday night, his first game since November 17. Miller took a leave of absence from the team for personal reasons and missed ten games but did not want to discuss the reason for his absence.
"Real quick, I just want to say something," said Miller before any of the gathered media could ask a question. "I'm playing tonight and I really would appreciate if we just stayed away from the reasons why I wasn't here, from all of you guys. You can ask all you want, but I'm not going to dive into the reasons why I wasn't here the last three or four weeks.
"I'm here, I'm with the team, and I'm ready to look forward to what's going to happen in the future, not necessarily what's happened in the past. I know you guys are going to ask no matter what but I'm just going to say I'm not talking about it and I just want to let you guys know ahead of time."
The media obliged, sticking to hockey talk for the three minutes of the scrum. The one hint at his time away was when he said, "A little bit of both," when asked if he watched Canucks games closely during his absence or if being "away from the game entirely" was the point. Miller also touched on how tough it was to be away from the team for that long.
"It sucks no matter what it's for," said Miller. "This is a family away from family here. You miss the guys and I'm just excited to be around them and get back and compete."
Miller participated in one full practice and two morning skates with his teammates, though he was skating on his own before that, so feels that conditioning won't be an issue.
"I'm sure rust is expected," said Miller. "I'm just going to try to keep it easy on myself, just try to play my game. Literally, try to make it easy on myself: keep it simple, play physical, things that I can control."
Miller's return should provide a big boost to the team, which has had to get significant contributions from other players like Pius Suter in his absence.
"I'm excited, he's excited, the players are excited," said head coach Rick Tocchet. "He's one of the best players in the league, so when you get a guy back in the lineup like that, it means a lot."
Fans will surely welcome Miller back enthusiastically in the building on Thursday night, as they frequently chanted his name during previous games, not to mention at a WWE event in Rogers Arena. Miller had to admit he wasn't aware of all of those occasions.
"I'm pretty out of the loop on it," said Miller. "Whatever it was, I appreciate it."
Vancouver Canucks projected lines
With Miller returning to the lineup, there will be a shakeup to the forward lines. What those lines will look like exactly might be unclear until the Canucks take the ice for warm-up but we can make some educated guesses based on the information available.
Here are the Canucks' projected lines:
Head coach Rick Tocchet said that Miller will centre a line between Brock Boeser and possibly Nils Höglander.
"I might give Höggy a shot up there as a forechecking guy," said Tocchet.
With Boeser returning to Miller's wing, That leaves a spot open on Elias Pettersson's right side. The Canucks could put Conor Garland on that line but my best guess is that Kiefer Sherwood will move back into that spot after he saw some success with Pettersson and Jake DeBrusk earlier in the season. That would allow the Canucks to keep Garland and Dakota Joshua together.
Pius Suter will presumably drop back to third-line centre with Garland and Joshua, keeping that line intact. Teddy Blueger will centre the fourth line, with Aatu Räty expected to come out of the lineup.
Miller isn't the only Canuck returning to the lineup, as Derek Forbort is expected to play on the third pairing on Thursday. It's his first game since November 2 after he suffered an injury during practice the next day.
Unfortunately for fans of efficient puck movement, that means Erik Brännström will be a healthy scratch for the second game in a row. Brännström's underlying numbers were not particularly good in the three games leading to his healthy scratch but it's hard to say whether the blame lies more with Brännström or with his defence partner, Vincent Desharnais.
The Canucks' starting goaltender will be Kevin Lankinen after Thatcher Demko made his season debut on Tuesday.
Florida Panthers projected lines
The defending Stanley Cup champions are once again one of the top teams in the NHL. They sit on top of the Atlantic Division standings with an 18-9-2 record and they have been particularly dangerous offensively, averaging 3.66 goals per game.
Sam Reinhart leads the Panthers in scoring. He's on pace to score 50+ goals for a second straight season with 19 goals and 39 points in 29 games so far.
Here are the Panthers' projected lines:
Carter Verhaeghe - Aleksander Barkov - Sam Reinhart
Jesper Boqvist - Sam Bennett - Matthew Tkachuk
Eetu Luostarinen - Anton Lundell - Evan Rodrigues
A.J. Greer - Tomas Nosek - Mackie Samoskevich
Gustav Forsling - Aaron Ekblad
Niko Mikkola - Dmitry Kulikov
Nate Schmidt - Uvis Balinskis
Sergei Bobrovsky
Spencer Knight
The Panthers' starting goaltender is expected to be Sergei Bobrovsky, who has not been spectacular this season with an .896 save percentage but has been good enough to win games. It certainly helps that the Panthers allow just 27.0 shots against per game, one of the lowest in the league.
