Narratives can change quickly in a playoff series. The Tampa Bay Lightning took the first step in rewriting their story as they downed the Florida Panthers, 5-1, in Game 3. Playing without Brandon Hagel, who was serving a one-game suspension, the Bolts came back from an early 1-0 deficit to wheel off five straight goals, and, at the very least, extended the series another game. Jake Guentzel had three points, and Nikita Kucherov added three more assists to his career total while Andrei Vasilevskiy stopped 33-of-34 shots.
Down two games in a series in which they hadn’t led for a single second, the Lightning wanted to get off to a quick start and…well that went out the window.
Matthew Tkachuk (Sam Bennett, Evan Rodrigues) 1-0 Panthers
Look, we can talk about how that was the result of an unlucky bounce as Sam Bennett whiffed on his shot only for the puck to go right to an unmarked Matthew Tkachuk, but the Lightning had a chance to clear it and didn’t. Erik Cernak had a chance to shut Bennett down along the boards and didn’t. Yes, it’s a lucky bounce, but it’s one that the Lightning facilitated.
The good news is that Lightning are quite used to being behind in this series, so the early goal didn’t really phase them. Andrei Vasilevskiy fended off some early quality chances, but Tampa Bay started to build their game as the period continued. It took them awhile to start getting shots on net (and only totaled 5 in the period), but they spent some more time in the Florida zone.
After Conor Geekie grazed the crossbar with a nice shot off the rush, the much beleaguered Nikita Kucherov showed that he can still stick-handle in a phone booth filled with drunk octopuses as he slipped a sneaky little pass to Jake Guentzel. Jake had some nifty stickwork as well to get the shot off. The puck grazed off of a leaping Brayden Point just enough to deflect past Sergei Bobrovsky.
Brayden Point (Jake Guentzel, Nikita Kucherov) 1-1
So, here we are, a carbon copy of Game 1. Florida scores first, the Lightning tie it after a run of solid play. Tampa Bay changed the outcome a bit this time, albeit adding the difficulty by taking a late penalty, by getting to intermission with the score still tied. Bobrovsky almost gave them a gift as he misplayed a puck back to him, but the puck stayed wide of the net as he let it trickle through him.
Despite starting the period with the power play, Florida couldn’t muster another goal, and the period settled into the expected back-and-forth, tight-checking, lack-of-explosive-offense struggle that we all expected prior to the start of the series. If nothing else, that played into the Lightning’s hands as it seemed to suck the energy out of the crowd.
Florida was still able to get their forecheck going at times, but the Lightning were doing a better job of bottling them up in their own zone or in the neutral zone. There were a few moments where Tampa Bay was caught in their zone, but they kept a lot of the shots to the outside, and took out Florida players in front of the net to keep them from getting to second chances.
Conor Geekie, who had been skating with a lot more confidence in this game, generated a great opportunity and he stormed into the zone, skated around the around, and drew Bobrovsky out of position before dishing the puck back to a wide-open Emil Lilleberg. The young Norwegian could have skated the puck into the net, but unfortunately the pass was slightly off and went out of the zone.
The teams traded unsuccessful power plays, or if you’re a positive person – successful penalty kills, but the Lightning picked up their first lead of the series as they took advantage of a sloppy line change by the Panthers to generate a little momentum in the neutral zone. Gage Goncalves slipped a nice pass to Nick Paul and the forward who does it all got a shot off that hit might have been going wide, but the puck hit Bobrovsky’s pad and into the net.
Nick Paul (Gage Goncalves, Ryan McDonagh) 2-1 Lightning
Vasilevskiy kept the lead stopping all 13 shots he faced, with his best being on a redirection off of Eetu Luostarinen’s stick. There was plenty of acrimony between the two teams, and it started to spill over after Tkachuck dumped Victor Hedman (who didn’t have the puck) in the Lightning crease. That led to Tkachuk picking up an unsportsmanlike penalty. Tampa Bay wasn’t able to take advantage, and then things evened up after Anthony Cirelli was singled out for roughing in a post-whistle scrum at the end of the period.
The Bolts entered the third period with a one-goal lead, their first of the series, and with a one-goal lead wanted to, well, make it a two-goal lead if they can, and the Lightning could. Just as the Lightning were about to go short-handed, Nikita Kucherov entered the zone with the puck, had his shot directed wide of the net, but he followed it up and flipped a no-look pass to the middle of the ice, where Jake-on-the-spot chipped a bouncing puck over Bobrovsky’s shoulder.
Jake Guentzel (Nikita Kucherov, Ryan McDonagh) 3-1 Lightning
That is a great way to build some confidence in your game. Look, the Lightning are a proud team, and they believe in their system. To finally get some rewards after two games of hard work, seemed to put a little bounce in their step. Florida wasn’t going to go away (and they still had a power play). Tampa Bay killed it off and immediately went back on the power play when Luostarinen tripped up Erik Cernak in the Lightning zone. Killing off another penalty just continued to add to their in-game confidence.
Nothing came of the extra skater for the Bolts, but it did help bleed off a little more clock. Florida had their chance to cut into the Lightning lead a few minutes later when Nick Paul went to the box for holding (after getting his stick broken and glove knocked off, he had to do something). While Florida had some solid zone time, a couple of nice blocks, and Vasilevskiy stopping a point-blank shot from Aleksander Barkov kept the score at 3-1.
Down by two on home ice, it was time for Florida to start pressing a bit. The Lightning caught them with an odd-man rush but Paul’s shot flashed off of the crossbar. Shortly after that, Gage Goncalves stepped up at the blueline to get the puck out and managed to push a pass to Yanni Gourde. With the Florida defense caught up ice, it turned into a two-on-one that Luke Glendening buried for his first playoff goal since May of 2023 when he was with Dallas.
Luke Glendening (Yanni Gourde, Gage Goncalves) 4-1 Lightning
Never one to go quietly into the loss column, Paul Maurice pulled Bobrovsky with 5:30 minutes to go in the game. With Brandon Hagel in the press box, his bestest buddy Anthony Cirelli took care of the empty-net duties to make it 5-1.
Anthony Cirelli (Jake Guentzel) Empty Net, 5-1 Lightning
Oh boy, Matthew Tkachuk. That hit on Jake Guentzel was something. If only the Department of Player Safety had some sort of reference point for a late hit on an unsuspecting player that was delivered with excessive force. Wherever could they find something like that?
Tkachuk was given a five-minute major. The Lightning did not score on it. It’s not that they weren’t trying to score, but they really just wanted to get to the end of the game without anymore shenanigans. Of course, there were a few extra chops and Cirelli took unkindly to Niko Mikkola’s shot on Kucherov following a face-off, so they were both given unsportsmanlike penalties.
The Lightning are back in the series, but still down two games to one. Some doubts might have crept into Florida’s game as well as they’ve now been held to just two 5v5 goals over the last two games. Monday night should be fun!
