TAMPA — The Florida Panthers expected the Tampa Bay Lightning to come out Saturday as if its season depended on it.
Not sure the Panthers were actually completely ready for what Tampa brought, however.
The Lightning played its best period of this series, opening with three goals in the first 16 minutes of play.
Although the Panthers got within a goal, Tampa Bay and its biggest stars showed up for this one and kept the first-round series going with a 6-3 win.
Florida still controls the best-of-7 series with a 3-1 lead; Game 5 will be Monday night in Sunrise.
The Lightning got its first three goals off a mixture of power play (Steven Stamkos), penalty kill (Brandon Hagel) and 4-on-4 (Brayden Point).
The Panthers came out flying in the second, making it 3-1 on Carter Verhaeghe’s goal.
Down 4-1 in the second, the Panthers pulled within one on goals from Sam Reinhart and Oliver Ekman-Larsson.
Florida appeared to have all of the momentum, something it carried into the third.
Only Andrei Vasilevskiy was great again, and the Panthers never got closer.
Midway through the third, Stamkos got his second of the game with a pretty no-look shot from the top of the circle.
It was the only 5-on-5 goal Florida allowed on Saturday.
By the end, things deteriorated with Brandon Montour going in for cross-checking Nikita Kucherov with Gus Forsling already in the box.
Nick Paul made it 6-4 with the 5-on-3 goal and that ended things.
1. Steven Stamkos, Tampa Bay
2. Brandon Hagel, Tampa Bay
3. Brayden Point, Tampa Bay
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