Panthers Win Battle of Florida, Thrash Lightning 9-2

Saturday afternoon saw the Battle of Florida return and the boys from South Florida won it in dominating fashion, with the Florida Panthers smoking the Tampa Bay Lightning 9-2 at Amalie Arena. 

 

After conceding just 24 seconds into the game, the Panthers played the rest of the game like they were the only team on the ice. They scored six unanswered goals against Lightning starting goalie Andrei Vasilevskiy and then an additional three on goalie Jonas Johansson. 

 

Matthew Tkachuk and Sam Bennett both had four-point nights, Carter Verhaeghe scored his 30th of the season and Kevin Stenlund had the game winner way back in the first period.

 

The Panthers have won their past five games and also extended their road winning streak to 11 on Saturday.  

 

Sergei Bobrovsky had 28 saves in his 27th win of the season. Florida improved to 36-15-4, jumping Boston for sole possession of first place in the East. 

 

Here’s Saturday’s takeaways.

 

Verhaeghe reaches consecutive 30-goal seasons

In his three seasons with the Panthers, Carter Verhaeghe has quickly turned into one of the best goal scorers in the National Hockey League.

 

Verhaeghe scored twice on Saturday to reach the 30-goal mark on the season. He became the second Panthers player to reach that number this season (Sam Reinhart was first).

 

The 28-year-old forward has scored 30 goals in back-to-back seasons, becoming just the fourth player in franchise history to do so. Last season, Verhaeghe scored 42 goals in 81 games.

 

“I’m playing with some pretty great players,” Verhaeghe responded when asked about his 30 goals. “It’s a good accomplishment, but obviously not the main goal.”

 

Verhaeghe is on pace to score 44 goals. His career-high is 42 (2022-23). 

 

Second-line drives the offense again, Verhaeghe adds

The Panthers get offense up and down the line up, which was evident on Saturday with 13 different players recording at least a point against the Lightning. 

 

As of late, a main driver has been the second line of Matthew Tkachuk and Sam Bennett.

 

Carter Verhaeghe also joined the fold against Tampa. (* An earlier version of this article didn’t separate Verhaeghe from the second line. He played on line 1 on Saturday)

 

On Saturday, all three players scored two goals. Bennett and Tkachuk led all skaters with four points each, while Verhaeghe finished with three.

 

Bennett snapped a six-game point drought in the win. 

 

“We played hard and we played right to the end,” Bennett said. “We weren’t gonna take our foot off the gas.”

 

Tkachuk remains the NHL’s leading scorer in 2024 with 37 points in 19 games. The Panthers forward has 18 multi-point games this season — Saturday being his third, four-point game. 

 

“Point wise he’s tearing it up right now. But I think the whole season, whether he’s on the scoresheet or not, he’s a key player for us,” Panthers captain Aleksander Barkov said of Tkachuk. “On-ice obviously everyone sees what he’s doing. Off-ice he’s the leader. He does everything right.”

 

Lightning score first, score last, Panthers stack nine in between

Nine goals by a single team is about as “in your face” as a box score can get. Yet, if you watched just the first 30 seconds of Saturday’s game, you’d think Tampa would be the team to run away with it. 

 

Brandon Hagel scored just 24 seconds into the game on Tampa’s first shot — giving the Lightning an early 1-0 lead. 

 

The Panthers didn’t let the extremely early deficit get to them though.  

 

After conceding Florida scored nine unanswered goals; four in the first period, two in the second and three more in the third before Tampa finally got a second past Sergei Bobrovsky. 

 

“They started hot in the first shift scoring the goal but we bounced back really quick,” Barkov said. “[We got] a couple goals, got a good lead there and Bob was amazing again. It was a great team win.”

 

Bobrovsky has given up two or less goals in his last six starts — all of those being wins. 

 

“Goaltending has been very, very good,” head coach Paul Maurice said.

 

Panthers Notes

Brandon Montour had a goal and two assists

 

Gustav Forsling had a goal and an assist

 

Jonah Gadjovich and two fights and a misconduct

 

Kevin Stenlund had a goal, Ryan Lomberg an assist

 

Josh Mahura drew into the lineup for Aaron Ekblad (lower-body) — Ekblad is day-to-day