Sergei Bobrovsky makes 31 saves, Panthers beat Lightning 6-1; advance

SUNRISE, Fla. (AP) — Aleksander Barkov remembers the disappointment of years past.

The Tampa Bay Lightning had eliminated his Florida Panthers from the NHL playoffs in each of their previous three meetings, and if the Panthers wanted to cement themselves as one of the NHL’s best, this year’s result needed to be different.

“At some point you knew you were going to have them again,” Barkov said, “and you’ve got to be able to get over that hump, and we did it this year.”

Barkov and Carter Verhaege each had two goals and an assist to go along with 31 saves from Sergei Bobrovsky, and the Panthers beat the Lightning 6-1 in Game 5 on Monday night to clinch their firstround series and advance in the NHL playoffs.

Niko Mikkola had a goal and an assist, Evan Rodrigues also scored and Matthew Tkachuk had two assists for the Panthers, who won a playoff series against Tampa Bay for the first time in franchise history and clinched a postseason series at home for only the fourth time. Florida bested Boston and Philadelphia on home ice in the first two rounds of the 1996 playoffs, then eliminated Carolina at home in last season’s Eastern Conference finals en route to their second Stanley Cup Final appearance.

The Panthers didn’t downplay it: Monday night’s win meant a lot.

All three playoff series between the two teams have come in the last four years, with Tampa Bay winning the first one 4-2 in 2021 and then sweeping Florida in 2022. The Panthers won the first three games this year before the Lightning avoided elimination with a 6-3 win in Game 4, forcing the Panthers to close out the series on home ice.

“This was a big series for us,” said Tkachuk, who had three goals and six assists in the first round. “We always knew that for us ultimately to win it all, it was probably going to have to go through Tampa at some point, so just an amazing feeling closing it out at home.”

Victor Hedman scored for the Lightning, which was eliminated in the first round for the second straight year after reaching the Final three straight years. Andrei Vasilevsky stopped 33 shots.

Verhaeghe opened scoring for the Panthers with a four-on-four goal just 45 seconds into the second period. Verhaeghe grabbed his own rebound and wristed a shot past Vasilevsky.