SUNRISE — Paul Maurice said Saturday that if he was not coaching in these Stanley Cup playoffs, the series he would watch as a fan would be the one between the Florida Panthers and Tampa Bay Lightning.
Yeah, we’re with you.
Game 1 of the Battle of Florida III lived up to its pregame hype, with the Panthers pulling out a 3-2 win in a defensive slugfest.
The Panthers lead the best-of-7 series 1-0; Game 2 in Tuesday at 7:30.
Florida, which was knocked out of the playoffs by the Lightning in 2021 and ‘22, came ready on play on Sunday.
The Panthers intense forecheck kept the Lightning bottled up and forced one turnover after another.
Florida was only able to get one past Andrei Vasilevskiy despite its dominance.
Sasha Barkov got things started by forcing a turnover high in the offensive zone and quickly got the puck to Gus Forsling. The Florida defenseman sent a shot from the point toward the net, only Sam Reinhart redirected it and the puck trickled past Vasilevskiy.
Tampa Bay only had a couple of scoring chances in the first, but Brandon Hagel tied it at 16:04 of the first when he followed up a big rebound off a Anthony Cirelli shot.
The two teams played a scoreless second, but 58 seconds into the third. Barkov flashed a sharp shot to the net where Carter Verhaeghe put it through.
With 2:05 remaining, Matthew Tkachuk scored into an empty net to seemingly ice the game — only Steven Stamkos scored on a 6-on-4 power play (the net was empty) with 9.3 seconds left.
Florida won the ensuing faceoff and that was that.
1. Sasha Barkov, Florida
2. Sergei Bobrovsky, Florida
3. Andrei Vasilevskiy, Tampa Bay
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