SUNRISE, Fla.\u202f\u2013\u202fFlorida Panthers President of Hockey Operations & General Manager\u00a0Bill Zito\u00a0announced today that the club has agreed to terms with goaltender\u00a0Cooper Black\u00a0on a\u00a0two-year, two-way\u00a0contract extension through the\u00a02027-28\u00a0season.<\/p>\n
Black, 24, appeared in 42 regular season games in 2025-26 with Florida\u2019s American Hockey League (AHL) affiliate, the Charlotte Checkers, posting a\u00a025-13-4\u00a0record, 2.47 goals against average\u00a0and .903 save percentage, including one shutout.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The 6-foot-8, 223-pound native of Alpena, Mich., has played in 60 career AHL games with Charlotte over the past three seasons, logging a 36-18-5 record,\u00a02.37 goals against average, .903 save percentage and four shutouts.\u00a0He also appeared in seven contests\u00a0in 2024-25\u00a0with Florida\u2019s ECHL affiliate, the Savannah Ghost Pirates,\u00a0recording a 4-3-0 record.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Prior to his professional career, Black\u00a0played two seasons (2022-23 to 2023-24) with Dartmouth College, registering a\u00a0.904 save percentage\u00a0and five shutouts\u00a0across 60\u00a0NCAA\u00a0appearances. In 2023-24, he posted a\u00a013-8-8\u00a0record,\u00a0.910\u00a0save percentage, 2.58 goals against average and two shutouts\u00a0en\u00a0route to being named a finalist for the Ken Dryden ECAC Goaltender of the Year Award.\u00a0He was named to the ECAC All-Rookie Team in 2022-23 after registering three shutouts in his\u00a0freshman\u00a0campaign.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Undrafted, Black led the Nanaimo Clippers (BCHL) to a Coastal Conference championship in 2021-22 behind a league-leading .924 save percentage, producing a 24-7-1 record, 2.62 goals against average and two shutouts.\u00a0<\/p>\n
2026-27 Florida Panthers Territory Memberships are available now! Click\u00a0here<\/a>\u00a0to learn more. For all the latest in\u00a0Panthers\u00a0news, concerts and events at\u00a0Amerant\u00a0Bank Arena & FTL War Memorial, sign up for\u00a0’93 Society newsletter<\/a>\u00a0and receive information straight to your inbox. Visit\u00a0FloridaPanthers.com<\/a>\u00a0or\u00a0SeatGeek.com<\/a>\u00a0for all ticketing needs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SUNRISE, Fla.\u202f\u2013\u202fFlorida Panthers President of Hockey Operations & General Manager\u00a0Bill Zito\u00a0announced today that the club has agreed to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":692902,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[66],"tags":[385,99],"class_list":["post-692901","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/692901","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=692901"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/692901\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/692902"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=692901"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=692901"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=692901"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}