Lightning back on track with vintage performance against Panthers in Game 3

SUNRISE, Fla. -- There was a kind of stunned feeling after Game 2 of the Eastern Conference First Round series between the Florida Panthers and the Tampa Bay Lightning, a confusion born of the performance of the Lightning over the first two games. They were a team that had become a trendy pick to go to the Stanley Cup Final -- maybe even win -- facing off against the defending Cup champion, a team that had been wilting down the stretch.

Instead, the Lightning lost the first two games at home by a combined 8-2 score, managing just two goals by a team that had led the NHL in scoring in the regular season (3.56 goals per game), never leading for a single second, and losing Brandon Hagel to a suspension for the next game.

It didn't look good.

But it didn't feel that way in the room. It didn't feel that way to the Lightning.

"You would have never known sitting in the locker room after Game 2 that we were down 0-2," Lightning coach Jon Cooper said. "And so, riding into this game, it wasn't going to guarantee the result, but I knew damn well how the effort was going to be. And they delivered."

Led by Jake Guentzel's goal and two assists, the Lightning broke out in Game 3 with a 5-1 win at Amerant Bank Arena, cutting their best-of-7 series deficit to 2-1. They improved in just about every facet of the game, their penalty kill coming out of storage, their offense waking up, their physicality asserting itself.

"It's a huge win for our team," Guentzel said. "Gives us some confidence and some life in the series. To go on the road, sometimes it brings everyone together."

That started with Guentzel.

The forward, a veteran of 72 playoff games, but in his first postseason series with the Lightning since signing a seven-year, $63 million contract last summer, is tied for the team lead with four points (two goals, two assists) and now has 40 goals in 72 games in the postseason, good for 0.56 goals per playoff game. That ties him for sixth place all-time in the category (minimum 50 games played) with Colorado Avalanche forward Nathan MacKinnon and Edmonton Oilers forward Leon Draisaitl and behind only luminaries: Mario Lemieux (0.71), Mike Bossy (0.66), Maurice Richard (0.62), Cam Neely (0.61) and Wayne Gretzky (0.59), who was on hand and greeted Cooper postgame.

"Best time to play, playoffs," Guentzel said. "There's really nothing better than Stanley Cup Playoffs and being able to play in this. So you can't take it for granted. If you don't get up for these games, there's something wrong with you. It's just the best time of the year to play."

His 40th playoff goal made him third among active U.S.-born skaters in playoff goals, behind only Patrick Kane (53) and Chris Kreider (48).

"He's a warrior, man," forward Luke Glendening said. "He's not a big guy (5-foot-11, 178 pounds), but he plays hard every night. He's a heck of hockey player, that's for sure. … The bigger the moment, the brighter he shines. It's good to be on his team."

The Lightning had desperately needed to get their offense going after being smothered by the Panthers in Games 1 and 2, after being stymied by Sergei Bobrovsky and held in check in their own arena.

And that was especially true after the Panthers scored first again on Saturday.

But Brayden Point deflected the game-tying goal in with 2:45 remaining in the first period, a goal that was initially credited to Guentzel, allowing Nick Paul to give the Lightning their first lead of the series at 13:17 of the second.

"It was huge, no doubt," defenseman Ryan McDonagh said of the Point goal. "It's a different feeling, a little bit of confidence booster. You could just feel our forwards took it up another notch there as far as executing, hanging onto pucks, playing a little bit more poised and composed and seeing things happen out there. So that's a great sign."

After that, they piled on, with Guentzel scoring 21 seconds into the third, followed by Glendening at 14:19 and Anthony Cirelli into the empty net at 15:00.

It allowed them to take a breath.

This was Lightning hockey. This was the team that was expected. This was the team they knew they could be after Game 2, in that calm and cool postgame locker room, the team and the atmosphere they had built in the 12 years since Cooper arrived in Tampa Bay.

"We trusted our process here," McDonagh said. "Obviously you could go rogue after losing two, but we trusted our process, our system, and just went out and executed a little bit higher, a little bit better, and it paid off in the long run."

The Lightning are back in the series. The "Battle of the Sunshine State" is back on.