Verhaeghe scores in 3rd period, Panthers edge Lightning in Game 1

SUNRISE, Fla. -- Carter Verhaeghe broke a tie with a power-play goal early in the third period, helping the Florida Panthers to a 3-2 win against the Tampa Bay Lightning in Game 1 of the Eastern Conference First Round at Amerant Bank Arena on Sunday.

Verhaeghe gave Florida a 2-1 lead when he redirected Aleksander Barkov’s sharp feed from the right face-off circle just 58 seconds into the third.

Matthew Tkachuk had a goal and an assist, and Barkov had two assists for the Panthers, who are the No. 1 seed in the Atlantic Division. Sergei Bobrovsky made 17 saves.

“I think the guys who had the real challenge were in the net,” Florida coach Paul Maurice said of the dueling goalies. “There were stretches of grind and there were so many dangerous shooters who have all the shots.”

Steven Stamkos had a goal and an assist, and Andrei Vasilevskiy made 25 saves for the Lightning, the first wild card from the East.

Game 2 will be at Florida on Tuesday.

“They are at home, it’s Game 1, the crowd is pumped up and [Florida] had tons of energy,” Tampa Bay coach Jon Cooper said. “Give them tons of credit -- they went to their game plan, and we abandoned ours before it even started. Give our guys credit -- they weathered the storm for 12, 13 minutes and then we played. But that’s the problem -- 16 teams are in, and 16 teams are out. The margins of error are much smaller now.”

Sam Reinhart gave the Panthers a 1-0 lead at 6:17 of the first period. After Barkov forced a turnover in the offensive zone, Reinhart scored on a redirection of Gustav Forsling’s wrist shot that trickled past Vasilevskiy.

“It is always nice to get off to a good start,” Reinhart said. “We know there is a long way to go. We’re going one day at a time. We had a job to do today, and we executed. Now we rest up, recover and get ready for Game 2.”

Brandon Hagel tied it 1-1 at 16:04 on a rebound of Anthony Cirelli’s shot after the latter won an offensive-zone face-off against Sam Bennett.

Tkachuk made it 3-1 with an empty-net goal at 17:55 of the third.

“I thought we played really well to start the game,” Tkachuk said. “[Bobrovsky] was not really tested and then he got a lot at once including their goal, which we will fix.

“All in all, pretty happy with the start. We had four lines and six defensemen going. When ‘Bob’ was counted on, he came up huge for us.”

Stamkos scored on a power play with 10 seconds left and Vasilevsky pulled for an extra attacker for the 3-2 final.

The Panthers were 1-for-3 with the man-advantage; the Lightning were 1-for-2.

“We stuck to our game, but at the end of the day, we took too many penalties and it cost us the game,” Hagel said. “Throughout a series, a team is going to push at you.

“… This is a long series. There is a lot of confidence in this room.”

NOTES: Reinhart has 58 total goals this season (regular season and Stanley Cup Playoffs combined), one shy of the Panthers record set by Pavel Bure, who scored 59 in both the 1999-2000 and 2000-01 seasons. … Forsling’s assist was his 11th in the playoffs, tying him with Aaron Ekblad and Robert Svehla for the most by a defenseman in franchise history. … Verhaeghe added to his Panthers record with 16 playoff goals, seven of which came during their run to the Stanley Cup Final last season. … It was Stamkos’ 28th multipoint playoff game, second in Lightning history behind teammate Nikita Kucherov (46). … Tampa Bay defenseman Matt Dumba had a game-high 10 hits in 19:44 of ice time.