SUNRISE, Fla. (AP) — Jack Finley scored his first NHL goal early in the third period to break a tie and the Tampa Bay Lightning held on to beat the Florida Panthers 3-1 on Saturday night.
Emil Lilleberg and Zemgus Girgensons also scored for the Lightning. They improved to 8-2-0 in their last 10 games and 5-2-2 on the road.
Andrei Vasilevskiy stopped 23 shots for Tampa Bay.
Brad Marchand scored his team-leading 12th goal of the season for Florida, a power-play tally midway through the second period that tied it at 1.
But Finley picked up a loose puck near the blue line and skated in alone on goalie Sergei Bobrovsky for what became the go-ahead goal 4:09 into the third. Girgensons sealed it with an empty-netter with 50.3 seconds remaining.
Bobrovsky made 17 saves for Florida, which saw its two-game winning streak snapped.
It was the first game between the teams since Oct. 4, a preseason contest that saw more than 300 penalty minutes and both rosters getting depleted because so many players were sent to the locker room early because of those infractions.
Recommended for you
And this game was chippy at times — as Lightning-Panthers games tend to be — but it was nothing like the penalty-fest from the preseason. There were only 14 penalties, 13 of them 2-minute minors and the other a 4-minute double minor against the Lightning in the third. There were some scuffles, but nothing that rose to the level of a fighting penalty or a major.
Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
Keep the discussion civilized. Absolutely NO
personal attacks or insults directed toward writers, nor others who
make comments. Keep it clean. Please avoid obscene, vulgar, lewd,
racist or sexually-oriented language. Don't threaten. Threats of harming another
person will not be tolerated. Be truthful. Don't knowingly lie about anyone
or anything. Be proactive. Use the 'Report' link on
each comment to let us know of abusive posts. PLEASE TURN OFF YOUR CAPS LOCK. Anyone violating these rules will be issued a
warning. After the warning, comment privileges can be
revoked.
Please purchase a Premium Subscription to continue reading.
To continue, please log in, or sign up for a new account.
We offer one free story view per month. If you register for an account, you will get two additional story views. After those three total views, we ask that you support us with a subscription.
A subscription to our digital content is so much more than just access to our valuable content. It means you’re helping to support a local community institution that has, from its very start, supported the betterment of our society. Thank you very much!
(0) comments
Welcome to the discussion.
Log In
Keep the discussion civilized. Absolutely NO personal attacks or insults directed toward writers, nor others who make comments.
Keep it clean. Please avoid obscene, vulgar, lewd, racist or sexually-oriented language.
Don't threaten. Threats of harming another person will not be tolerated.
Be truthful. Don't knowingly lie about anyone or anything.
Be proactive. Use the 'Report' link on each comment to let us know of abusive posts.
PLEASE TURN OFF YOUR CAPS LOCK.
Anyone violating these rules will be issued a warning. After the warning, comment privileges can be revoked.