"You take that any day of the week or the year," Panthers coach Joel Quenneville, flashing a big smile out from under his mustache, said when asked about capping off a six-game road trip by taking three of four points from the Lightning. "We're happy to go home. It's been a long trip."
Netting his first goal as a member of the Panthers, Brandon Montour, who was picked up from the Buffalo Sabres prior to the trade deadline, opened the scoring tonight when his long shot from the point hit off a defender and past Andrei Vasilevskiy to make it 1-0 at 8:41 of the first period.
Keeping their foot on the gas and doubling the lead less than four minutes later on the power play, the Panthers struck again when Aleksander Barkov fired a shot that ricocheted off Patric Hornqvist's left skate and right through Vasilevskiy's five-hole to make it a 2-0 game at 12:31.
Slicing the deficit in half for the Lightning almost immediately, Brayden Point, who was dug in right outside the blue paint, re-directed a shot from Mikhail Sergachev to make it 2-1 at 13:40.
Ending the opening 20 minutes with an exclamation point, Jonathan Huberdeau followed-up on a long wrist shot from Markus Nutivaara and buried the ensuing rebound to make it 3-1 at 19:52.
"It was huge," Nutivaara said of coming out strong against Vasilevskiy, who hadn't lost a game at home this season. "You want to get those early goals. He's a good goalie, of course. We've just got to make it harder for him. Of course, we've got good goalies, too. It's a good battle."
Trading goals late in the second period, Frank Vatrano slipped a shot around Vasilevskiy on a breakaway to put the Panthers up 4-1 at 17:34. But less than two minutes after that, Erik Cernak ripped a shot past Sergei Bobrovsky through traffic to trim the Lightning's deficit to 4-2 at 19:15.
Helping the Lighting fight all the way back to within a single goal, Mathieu Joseph made it a 4-3 game when he re-directed a shot from Victor Hedman just 1:53 into the third period. Locking it down from there, the Panthers would then hold strong until Anthony Duclair danced through a pair of defenders before putting the game away with an empty-net goal to make it 5-3 at 19:10.
Coming up with his biggest save of the night a little before Duclair's goal, Bobrovsky used his right pad to rob Point of what appeared to be the game-tying goal. Earning his 16th win of the season, Bobrovsky finished the game with 28 saves, while Vasilevskiy stopped 27 of 31 shots.