The Florida Panthers are headed to the playoffs! Playoffs officially start this weekend. The Panthers will be playing this Sunday at 12:30pm EST against the Tampa Bay Lightning. Whoever wins this round will advance to the second series against the Boston Bruins or Toronto Maple Leafs.
Hopefully the team can make it back to the Stanley Cup again and win it this time around.
They played their last game this past Tuesday against the Toronto Maple Leafs. The Panthers finished the job winning 5-2 after being down 2-0 in the first period.
Due to the Boston Bruins losing to the Ottawa Senators the same night, Panthers will be playing the Tampa Bay Lightning in the first series of the playoffs. This rivalry has always been around and it’s time for the Panthers to get revenge, especially from the 2021-2022 season where the Panthers lost in the second round to the Lightning with an end result of a 4-0 series after beating the Capitals 4-2. So, things might get chippy.
The Panthers have only played against the Lighting three times this season, winning two games out of the three. One of those games being a Panthers victory 9-2 but the Lightning later had the last laugh in March. With that being said, this will be an interesting 1st round. Especially with talk about goalies on both ends of the ice. Andrei Vasilevskiy, the Tampa Bay Lightning goalie, has been the talk of many fan forums due to his performance. While he is still a great goaltender, there have been some issues this past season. That being so, Panther fans can also some-what relate with Sergei Bobrovsky throughout the season. He can be inconsistent here and there but overall has been a super strong goalie. I hope to see him in playoff mode this postseason.
For the Cats, they are still missing two defensemen, Aaron Ekblad and Oliver Ekman-Larsson. Luckily, they are both set to return for the start of the playoffs.
As for the Lightning, they have a handful of players out like defenseman, Mikhail Sergachev, and goalie, Jonas Johansson. Most of them are set to return for the playoffs.
Will this be a clean sweep for the Panthers like they did against the Carolina Hurricanes last post-season or will it be another Boston Bruins series?
