The Florida Panthers (37-21-3) will host the Tampa Bay Lighting (35-20-4) tonight at Amerant Bank Arena in a key meeting the two Atlantic Division rivals, who are separated by three points in the standings.
It was quite the weekend for the second place Cats, who were dominant in a 3-0 home ice victory over the Calgary Flames and traded backup goalie Spencer Knight and a first-round draft pick to the Chicago Blackhawks for defenseman Seth Jones. On the ice, the Panthers got goals from Johan Gadjovich, Evan Rodrigues and rookie Mackie Samoskevich to douse the Flames. Sergei Bobrovsky stopped 23 shots for his third shutout of the season and 47th of his career.
The Lightning enter tonight’s contest in the midst of an impressive eight-game winning streak. On Saturday, the Bolts posted a convincing 3-1 over the Eastern Conference-leading Washington Capitals at Capital One Arena. Mitchell Chaffee, Gage Goncalves and Brandon Hagel lit the lamp and Andrei Vasilevskiy came within 3:59 of a shutout before he surrendered Alex Ovechkin’s 884th goal. Vasilevskiy has only given up three goals in his last four starts.
- WHEN: 7 p.m. ET
- WHERE: Amerant Bank Arena – Sunrise, FL
- ON THE TUBE: Scripps, FDSNSUN
- ON THE DIAL: Radio Libre 790 (D/B), 1230 The Gambler (PB), Thunder 100.3 (Keys)
- SOCIALS: #TimeToHunt, #GoBolts, #TBLvsFLA, @LitterBoxCats, LBC FaceBook
- ENEMY INTEL: Raw Charge
- FLA IN SEASON SERIES: Game 3 of 4 (1-1)
- LAST MEETING: @TBL 4, FLA 0 (Recap) – 12/23/2024
- NEXT MEETING: April 15, 2025
- PROJECTED STARTERS: Florida: Bobrovsky (25-13-2 .904 / 2.59 3SO) Tampa Bay: Vasilevskiy (29-15-3 .923 / 2.18 4SO)
- PLAYER STATS: Florida / Tampa Bay
Monday in the Atlantic (Standings/Panthers Playoff Chances)
- OTTAWA (30-25-4 64P) at Washington (38-14-8 84P) 6:30 p.m.
- BUFFALO (24-29-5 53P) at MONTREAL (29-26-5 63P) 7 p.m.
- San Jose (15-37-9 39P) at TORONTO (38-20-2 78P) 7 p.m.
Idle: DET (66P), BOS (64P)