Stanley Cup Playoffs Day 10: Panthers eliminate Lightning with 6-1 win, Stars tie series

Scott Maxwell
Scott Maxwell
Stanley Cup Playoffs Day 10: Panthers eliminate Lightning with 6-1 win, Stars tie series
Credit: © Jim Rassol

Both the Tampa Bay Lightning and the Dallas Stars found themselves trailing in their series and in need of a road win, but only one team escaped the night with a victory.

Barkov, Verhaeghe score twice as Panthers eliminate Bolts with 6-1 win

After a failed attempt at eliminating the Tampa Bay Lightning on Saturday, the Florida Panthers were looking to end the series for good on home ice. But it wasn’t going to be easy, as this experienced Bolts team wasn’t going to go down without a fight. Or at least we thought that would be the case.

It was a tightly contested matchup through the first two periods, with the first period seeing no goals at all. There was thought to be one from Anthony Cirelli midway through the first period, but Anthony Duclair had interfered with Sergei Bobrovsky, and a Florida challenge overturned the goal.

The second period opened up a bit more, first with Carter Verhaeghe scoring 45 seconds into the frame, and then Aleksander Barkov scoring midway through it to give the Panthers a 2-0 lead. Victor Hedman responded just a minute after that to make it a one-goal game, and the Bolts thought they had the game tied when Mikhail Sergachev scored later in the second, but once again it got called back for goaltender interference.

It remained a 2-1 game for the first half of the third, with the Bolts trying to get the game tied to keep their season alive. But then Barkov scored his second of the game at the 11-minute mark to give Florida a 3-1, and the floodgates opened. Evan Rodrigues scored a few minutes later to put it out of reach, and then Verhaeghe and Niko Mikkola scored on the empty net in the final four minutes to make it 6-1 for the final score, and the Panthers were off to the second round. Barkov and Verhaeghe both also had assists to finish with three points on the night, while Bobrovsky stopped 31 of 32 shots to get the win.

The Panthers advance to the second round of the playoffs for the third straight season, and will face either the Boston Bruins or the Toronto Maple Leafs, with the Bruins currently up 3-1 in their respective series. Meanwhile, after three consecutive trips to the Stanley Cup Finals, the Lightning have been eliminated in the first round of the playoffs for the second straight season. It’s also the first time the Panthers have beaten the Lightning in a series.

Oettinger’s 32 saves help Dallas tie series with 4-2 win

While there wasn’t nearly as much urgency as Saturday night, the Dallas Stars were in desperate need of another win against the Vegas Golden Knights. Even though they weren’t down 3-0, even a 3-1 series deficit would have been tricky to overcome against a strong Vegas squad.

It didn’t quite start out the way the Stars would have wanted it to, but they managed to find a way to keep hanging on. When Michael Amadio opened the scoring in the first period, Evgenii Dadonov responded just over three minutes later to tie it. When Jack Eichel scored three minutes into the second period to make it 2-1, not only did Wyatt Johnston tie it midway through the frame, but Ty Dellandrea had a Matt Duchene shot bounce off of him and in with 86 seconds left to give the Stars the 3-2 lead, their first lead of the game.

Vegas pressed hard for the tying goal, outshooting the Stars 15-7 and out-attempting them 38-14, but Jake Oettinger held strong and kept the Stars in the lead. Roope Hintz secured the game for Dallas with an empty net goal (on a snipe from the defensive zone after making a painful blocked shot no less), and the Stars managed to hang on and win 4-2 to tie the series. On top of the 15 saves he made in the third period, Oettinger stopped 32 of the 34 shots he faced overall in the victory.

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