Tampa Bay Lightning vs. Florida Panthers Pick and Prediction – April 29, 2024

TAMPA BAY LIGHTNING VS. FLORIDA PANTHERS EXPERT PICK AND PREDICTION – April 29, 2024 — The biggest question as to whether this becomes a series is clear: Can the Panthers control the Lightning’s power play?

The Bolts finally got the better of Florida with the man advantage in Game 4, striking twice for power play goals en route to a 6-3 victory that kept the series alive. But for the series, Tampa Bay is 4-for-17 with the man advantage and was just 2-for-12 prior to Game 4.

Given that the Lightning converted on a league-best 28.6 percent of power play opportunities in the regular season, Florida was never going to completely shut down Tampa Bay with the man advantage. The Panthers’ best hope is to stay out of the penalty box and limit the damage that the Lightning can do. Five minors is far too many, especially when Tampa Bay spent Game 3 without taking a single penalty.

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Even worse was Florida’s tendency to take multiple penalties at once. In Game 4, the Panthers short-circuited their own comeback attempts by taking two penalties in 13 seconds, giving the Lightning a two-man advantage with a two-goal cushion. Tampa Bay scored within 30 seconds, ending any threat of a Florida comeback. This time, the Panthers have to make sure they don’t give the Lightning any hope

The Odds

Puck Drop

When: Monday, April 29 at 7 p.m. EST

Where: FLA Live Arena, Sunrise, Fla.

TV: ESPN

Public Bets: 89% on Florida

Public Money: 82% on Florida

Odds courtesy of DraftKings, as of April 28th, 2024

Tampa Bay Lightning vs. Florida Panthers In-Season Trends

The way Florida has played defense underscores just how much the Panthers have controlled the play in this series. Florida won all year with a powerful defense, and the Panthers have kept that up against Tampa Bay.

In their past 10 meetings with the Lightning, the Panthers have held Tampa Bay to two goals or less on six occasions and won all of them. Only Game 3 saw Florida win while giving up more than two goals, so it’s clear that two is the magic number.

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Given that Tampa Bay hasn’t been scoring, you might expect the under to be a certain cash in a Florida win. It’s not that simple. The Lightning have let down on defense a few times, and the under is just 4-3 in Florida’s past seven wins over its in-state rival. However, in the three over cashes, the Panthers put at least five goals on the board every time.

Players to Watch

During the regular season, Nikita Kucherov scored a career-high 44 goals. During this playoff series, unless you happen to be an NHL player yourself, you’ve got as many goals as he does. Kucherov does have six assists to his name after racking up 100 of those during the season, but Tampa Bay needs him to offer both.

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The Lightning succeeded because they could count on any of Kucherov, Steven Stamkos and Brayden Point to find the mesh. Florida has turned that into Stamkos and occasionally Point, with Kucherov relegated to setting things up. The Lightning will take the assists, of course, but they need Kucherov to be a real threat with his shot.

Matthew Tkachuk and Carter Verhaeghe remain unstoppable for Florida in this series. Between them, they have 13 points and six goals. With Sam Reinhart a dependable third scorer, Tampa Bay hasn’t had an easy time of anything.

The Pick

Tampa Bay has fought in this series, but it’s clear the Lightning are overmatched. The Panthers are younger, hungrier and play the perfect style to really make Tampa Bay’s life difficult. This was always going to be the danger of how the run ended for Tampa Bay: the teams who knew they needed to figure them out were eventually going to develop a way to do it.

Florida’s done it and Tampa Bay doesn’t have the pieces to fully respond. The Panthers really don’t want this series to go back up I-75; they’ll be looking to finish it here. Odds are that they will.