Panthers (36-14-5 77P) vs Lightning (36-15-3 75P)
- WHEN: 7:00 p.m. ET
- WHERE: BB&T Center, Sunrise, FL
- ON THE TUBE: Bally Sports SUN
- ON THE DIAL: 560 WQAM (D/B), 640 WMEN (PB), 1370 WAXE (TC), Thunder 100.3 (Keys)
- SOCIALS: #FlaPanthers, #GoBolts, #TBLvsFLA, @LitterBoxCats, LBC FaceBook
- ENEMY INTEL: Raw Charge
- FLA IN SEASON SERIES: Game 8 of 8 (4-2-1)
- LAST MEETING: @FLA 5, TBL 1 – (Recap) – 5/8/2021
- NEXT MEETING: Playoffs!
- PROJECTED STARTERS: Driedger (13-6-3 .923/ 2.17 2SO) vs Vasilevskiy (31-9-1 .926/ 2.17 5SO)
- PLAYER STATS: Florida / Tampa Bay/
Scouting Report
The Tampa Bay Lightning and Florida Panthers will play their final regular season game on Monday and then head directly into a seven game playoff series against each other. Florida beat the Lightning 5-1 on Saturday in a fight filled game that saw a combined 154 penalty minutes. The Panthers have now won five in a row with a red hot powerplay at 30%. Sergei Bobrovsky continues to be a key piece to the success of the Panthers this season with his 2.91 goals against average and .906 save percentage. Florida has won four of the seven games these two have played and will have home ice in the first round which will be helpful as they are 19-5-3 at home this year. The Panthers have two highly skilled players on their top line and Jonathan Huberdeau leads the team with 61 points.
Tampa Bay now has their three best players out of the lineup and there is some uncertainty if they will be ready for the playoffs. Steven Stamkos, Nikita Kucherov and Victor Hedman will all be out for this final game. The Lightning have lost three of their last five games and have only scored an average of 2.2 goals per game over that stretch. Ondrej Palat has no goals in his last five games and Anthony Cirelli has no points in his last 10. Tampa Bay’s depth is not good enough to win them games without their super stars.
Full preview at Pickswise
Monday in the Central (Standings/Panthers Playoff Chances):
- CAROLINA (36-11-8 80P) at NASHVILLE (30-23-2 62P) 8 p.m.
- DALLAS (22-19-14 58P) at CHICAGO (24-25-6 54P) 8 p.m. NBCSN/
Idle: DET (48P), CLS (48P)
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