SUNRISE, Fla. (AP) — Pierre-Edouard Bellemare scored the go-ahead aim early within the third interval, Andrei Vasilevskiy remained red-hot with 34 saves and the Tampa Bay Lightning topped the Florida Panthers 4-1 in Game 1 of an Eastern Conference semifinal sequence Tuesday evening.
Nikita Kucherov and Corey Perry every had a aim and an help, and Ross Colton additionally scored for the two-time defending Stanley Cup champions, who went forward 1-0 in opposition to their in-state rivals for the second consecutive season.
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Time and once more, Vasilevskiy slammed the door on Florida. Over his final three video games — all of them wins, together with Game 7 at Toronto on Sunday — he’s stopped 94 of 99 pictures.
Anthony Duclair had the aim for Presidents’ Trophy-winning Florida, which received 32 saves from Sergei Bobrovsky. Including the qualifying spherical that was held when the NHL restarted in the course of the pandemic in 2020, Florida has misplaced seven consecutive Game 1s — a streak that goes again to 1997.
Game 2 is Thursday evening.
Duclair, a 31-goal scorer, was scratched by Florida for its series-clinching win at Washington, however he was again Tuesday and gave his workforce the lead by scoring on a cross from Jonathan Huberdeau at 14:01 of the primary.
Duclair’s aim got here after the Panthers killed off a pair of early penalties — one from MacKenzie Weegar and the opposite from Duclair — as particular groups turned an element within the sport.
Florida went 0 for 18 on the ability play within the sequence win in opposition to the Capitals and was scoreless on three extra tries Tuesday. But Tampa Bay cashed in three of its six probabilities.
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After Kucherov was hooked by Weegar, he went proper round Aaron Ekblad and fed Perry for a tap-in aim at 16:22 of the second interval.
Bellemare’s aim got here 3:35 into the third interval, giving Tampa Bay its first lead of the sport — and the Lightning stored it the remainder of the best way. The Lightning received a faceoff within the Florida zone and Perry took a fast shot from the slot that Bobrovsky stopped, however the rebound squirted proper to Bellemare.
He beat Bobrovsky to the glove aspect for a 2-1 lead.
It appeared, for a second, Florida ended its lengthy energy play drought and tied the rating when Duclair scored on a free puck. Tampa Bay challenged, saying the puck went off the netting and was due to this fact out of play. Video evaluate confirmed that and the Lightning continued to guide 2-1.
That was the final hurrah for Florida. Tampa Bay left little doubt late, with Kucherov and Colton every getting power-play tallies within the last 4:06 to place the sport away.
NOTES: It was coach Jon Cooper’s 124th playoff sport with the Lightning. That broke a tie with Mike Babcock (Detroit) for fifth-most with one workforce, behind solely Al Arbour (198, New York Islanders), Scotty Bowman (134, Detroit), Joel Quenneville (128, Chicago) and Glen Sather (127, Edmonton). … Florida fell to 4-8 in Game 1s, together with the qualifying spherical two years in the past. … Tampa Bay improved to 15-19 in Game 1s.
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