This might be Kyle Okposo’s last chance for a Stanley Cup. The Panthers have made it a ‘fun ride’

Kyle Okposo wasn’t in the lineup for the first two games of the Florida Panthers’ Eastern Conference final series against the New York Rangers.

But the veteran forward knows how raucous the crowd can be at Madison Square Garden and got an up close experience with it during those first two games.

“I could hear the fans chirping me from the press box,” said Okposo, who watched the game from the upper levels of the arena with the other Panthers players who weren’t active on game day.

If Okposo hears any chirping this time around, it’ll be because of his performance on the ice.

Okposo, who has been in and out of Florida’s lineup since being acquired from the Buffalo Sabres at the trade deadline, will draw into the Panthers’ lineup on Thursday for Game 5 of the Eastern Conference final as Panthers coach Paul Maurice sticks with the group that won Game 4 in overtime on Tuesday in Sunrise to even the best-of-7 series at two games apiece.

“I’m really looking forward to it,” Okposo said. “The atmosphere here is incredible and it’s going to be a fun challenge.”

Okposo, 36 years old and finishing his 17th NHL season, is embracing every opportunity and every challenge that comes his way throughout this playoff run. It’s his first time in the playoffs since 2016 with the New York Islanders (Fun fact: Okposo had the primary assist on the game-winning goal in double overtime to eliminate the Panthers from the playoffs that year). Realistically, this could also be his final chance to win a Stanley Cup.

So even though his role has changed — he went from being a captain in Buffalo to having to compete just to get on the ice on any given day — Okposo knows the importance of this postseason.

And he also considers himself fortunate that the team he joined in the Panthers has helped him make an almost seamless transition.

“Honestly, this group makes it easy,” said Okposo, who has played 1,051 career regular-season NHL games but on Thursday will be suiting up for just his 34th career Stanley Cup playoff game. “With the guys that are in the locker room and how accepting that they were from Day 1 to me, I just tried to come in and just be a spoke in the wheel and not disrupt anything but add something when I can. Whether I’m in the lineup or not, I just try to be the same person. Obviously, when you’re in the lineup, you have a bit more of a voice, a bit more of an impact on the game. I just try to be myself and help the group in any way that I can. It’s been a fun ride.”

But it didn’t come without having to make some adjustments. Okposo played in just six of the Panthers’ 18 regular-season games after being acquired from the Sabres and has been a healthy scratch six times in the playoffs as well.

The reason is twofold.

The first is Florida’s forward depth. When the team is fully healthy, Maurice has five players — Okposo, Steven Lorentz, Ryan Lomberg, Nick Cousins and Jonah Gadjovich — to fill the two wing spots on his fourth line.

The second is Okposo was learning a new style, a new system, on the fly late in the season. That, Maurice said, “took him a little while.”

“He’s really honest. He was a captain. He wants to do the right thing, so he’s gonna process before he acts on the ice,” Maurice said. “Again, everything is different here. We run a completely different neutral zone, so he needed time to process — and this is not an intelligence thing; it’s a character thing. He doesn’t want to make a mistake out there. He’s not letting his teammates down.”

Once he got more comfortable in playing the Panthers’ style, he found a second gear in his game. He was more aggressive on the forecheck. There was a little more speed.

And he has made a noticeable impact on the ice. He has logged a pair of assists so far in the playoffs — including the secondary assist on Florida’s go-ahead goal in Game 3 of Round 1 against the Tampa Bay Lightning in his first game of the playoffs and the primary assist on Florida’s game-winning goal in Game 4 of Round 2 against the Boston — in addition to logging 28 hits and having five scoring chances of his own.

“He’s trusting his reads,” Maurice said. “You take any player and you force him to read, he slows down. That’s why, when we talk about chemistry, that’s all we’re really talking about — that two people don’t have to slow down to read each other; they have a pretty good idea of what’s happening. It’s predictability. He’s figured out our system, he’s figured out our style of play and he’s a conscientious man.

“Now, he just has to go out and play.”