Roberto Luongo confirms he's ready to go

Goalie Roberto Luongo, who had offseason hip surgery, has been cleared to practice Friday when the Florida Panthers start training camp.
"Good to go," Luongo said Thursday. "It's a lot of hard work over the summer, but I'm really happy with the way things progressed. Going into it, I wasn't quite sure how it was going to go, but excited to be here first day of training camp and clean bill of health."

Luongo, 37, had surgery after Florida was eliminated by the New York Islanders in the Eastern Conference First Round in April and has been a regular participant in informal workouts at the Panthers practice facility. He said those workouts were but a small part of his rehabilitation.
"Most of it was off ice. You guys (reporters) just saw the tail end of it where I started skating," he said. "But the first three months was pretty long coming to the rink every day and mostly rehab in the first month, and then starting to do some exercises once I was able to start walking around. It was about three or four hours a day during the weekdays every day for the whole summer. It was a lot of work."

Florida general manager Tom Rowe said Tuesday he expected Luongo would be ready for camp.
"He's good to go, from everything I've heard and watching him with our training staff and then working out with (physical therapist) Tim Wittenauer," Rowe said. "Everything looks really good.
"Definitely opening night. That was his goal and he's right on target for that."
The Panthers open the regular season against the New Jersey Devils at BB&T Center on Oct. 13.
Luongo was 35-19-6 with a 2.35 goals-against average and .922 save percentage in 62 games (60 starts) last season, but the Panthers signed goaltender James Reimer to a five-year contract July 1 with the idea of lightening Luongo's workload.
Luongo is the NHL's active leader in games played (926), wins (436) and shutouts (72).