Panthers vs. Lightning | Round One Playoff Notes

Matchup History – The Battle of Florida

  • The Panthers or Lightning have represented the Eastern Conference in the Stanley Cup Final in each of the past five seasons, with a Florida team winning the Stanley Cup in three of those Final series (TBL – 2020 and 2021, FLA – 2024).

  • The Panthers (2023 and 2024) and Lightning (2020, 2021 and 2022) are the two most recent NHL teams to make Stanley Cup Final appearances in consecutive seasons.

  • Florida and Tampa Bay have faced off against each other in three previous postseasons (First Round: 2020-21 and 2023-24; Second Round: 2021-22), with the Panthers earning the most recent series win in the First Round of the 2024 playoffs, 4-1.

  • The Panthers and Lightning have squared off 161 times in regular season history, with Florida posting a 79-55-10-19 record (Home: 45-19-4-11, Away: 34-34-6-8).

  • In the Bill Zito era (since the start of 2020-21), the Panthers own an 13-7-3 regular season record against Tampa Bay -- including 7-3-2 at Amalie Arena -- outscoring the Bolts 86-69. Paul Maurice owns a 6-4-1 record a Cats bench boss since taking the helm prior to 2022-23.

Last Time Out

  • Carter Verhaeghe (5-4-9) and Matthew Tkachuk (3-6-9) led FLA in points in the 2024 postseason series vs. TBL, with each player recording at least one point in all five games of the series. Tkachuk produced multiple points in four of the five contests. Verhaeghe led all skaters in the series with a plus-7 rating, and 15 different Panthers logged multiple points.

  • Verhaeghe scored the OT goal in Game 2 against Tampa Bay last season, marking his franchise-leading fifth career postseason OT winner, becoming the sixth skater in NHL history to score at least five playoff overtime goals, joining Patrick Kane, Corey Perry and Glenn Anderson (5 each), Maurice Richard (6) and Joe Sakic (8). Among that group of six skaters, Verhaeghe (81GP entering the 2025 postseason) is the only one who has skated in fewer than 100 postseason games.

  • Sergei Bobrovsky posted a 4-1 record vs. TBL in Round 1 last season, including a 3-0 record, .932 save percentage and 1.65 goals against average over Florida’s three home games where he surrendered just three total even-strength goals against.

2024-25 Season Series

  • The Cats downed the Bolts in two of their four regular season matchups (2-2-0) in 2024-25. Aleksander Barkov led Florida with three points (2-1-3) in three games played against Tampa Bay this season.

  • In the regular season series, Florida killed off 16 of 18 TBL power-plays (88.9%) while scoring two shorthanded goals for a net-even shorthanded score.

  • Both of those shorthanded goals were scored by A.J. Greer and Eetu Luostarinen on the same penalty kill when the Cats visited the Bolts on Dec. 22, the third time in club history the Panthers scored twice on the same PK (also: Feb. 9, 2023 vs. SJS and Dec. 30, 1998 at PIT).

FLA-TBL Connections

  • This series will feature five 4 Nations Face-Off champions in Florida’s Brad Marchand, Sam Reinhart and Sam Bennett and Tampa Bay’s Brayden Point, Anthony Cirelli and Brandon Hagel.

  • Additionally, Matthew Tkachuk and Jake Guentzel (USA), Gustav Forsling and Victor Hedman (Sweden) represented their countries together at the tournament.

  • Panthers forward Carter Verhaeghe appeared in 52 regular games with the Tampa Bay Lightning in 2019-20, amassing 13 points (9-4-13), and posted two assists over eight playoff games en route to capturing his first Stanley Cup with the Lightning, and is the only player to win a Stanley Cup with both Florida NHL franchises.

  • Panthers Senior Advisor to the General Manager Rick Dudley served as General Manager of the Lightning from 1999-00 to 2001-02.

  • TBL D Darren Raddysh played with Panthers forward Sam Bennett (GTHL U16) and Gustav Forsling (Rockford IceHogs)

  • TBL F Zemgus Girgensons played with Dmitry Kulikov, Sam Reinhart and Evan Rodrigues on the Buffalo Sabres.

  • TBL F Cam Atkinson played with Sergei Bobrovsky and Seth Jones on the Columbus Blue Jackets.

Noteworthy

  • Aleksander Barkov has amassed 40 points (9-31-40) in 47 career regular season contests against the Lightning.

  • Among active NHL players, Brad Marchand’s six regular season game-winning goals vs. Tampa Bay rank second behind only Alex Ovechkin (7).

  • Aaron Ekblad (0-1-1) notched his 250th career assist on Dec. 22, 2024 vs. TBL, surpassing Stephen Weiss for third most assists all-time in franchise history.

  • A.J. Greer (1-0-1) buried his first career shorthanded goal in the Panthers 4-2 victory on Dec. 22, 2024.

  • Evan Rodrigues skated in his 500th career NHL game on Dec. 22, 2024 vs. TBL.

  • Brad Marchand (1-0-1) tallied a goal in his 1,100th career NHL game on April 15, 2025 at TBL.