Cole Reinhardt’s six-second reply lifts Panthers past Lightning 5-3

Florida’s early finish gave the game its shape

The Panthers did not need a flood of shots to build their first advantage. Bokondji Imama opened the scoring at 19:44 of the first period with a deflected finish off feeds from Donovan Sebrango and Sam Lafferty, then Kai Schwindt made it 2-0 just 2:29 into the second with a snap shot set up by Cole Reinhardt and Mikulas Hovorka. Florida’s first two goals established a theme that held all night: Tampa Bay would spend long stretches chasing the score, even while doing enough elsewhere to stay close.

The Lightning answered with persistence rather than panic. Jansen Harkins cut the deficit to 2-1 at 3:14 of the second, finishing a play started by Ilya Mikheyev and J.J. Moser, and Conor Geekie leveled it at 13:09 with Sam O’Reilly and Benjamin Rautiainen on the setup. By then, Tampa Bay’s broader statistical edge was starting to show itself. The Lightning finished with 29 shots and won 60.3 percent of the faceoffs, useful numbers in a game that kept slipping into one-goal tension.

A tie at 5:29, a lead change at 5:35

The third period turned into a sequence of answers. Hunter St. Martin restored Florida’s lead at 4:21 with a backhand off passes from Alexander Petrovic and Kai Schwindt. Harkins struck again at 5:29, his second goal of the night, with Ryan McDonagh and Jakob Pelletier drawing the assists to make it 3-3. Then came the sequence that will survive longest from this game: Reinhardt put Florida back ahead at 5:35, just six seconds later, and the Lightning were chasing all over again.

That exchange mattered because Tampa Bay had already erased one two-goal deficit and then fought back from 3-2 down. In another game, that might be the turning point that tilts the whole night. Instead, Florida made sure the equalizer barely had time to register. Sandis Vilmanis added the last goal at 19:36 of the third, finishing from Lars Eller and Garnet Hathaway, and the Panthers closed the night still in front, as they had been from Imama’s opener onward.

The Panthers absorbed more than they owned

This was not a game Florida won by controlling every category. Tampa Bay held the shot edge, 29-24, and dominated the dots with a 35-23 faceoff advantage. But the Panthers were harder in the areas that can keep a lead alive. They blocked 18 shots to Tampa Bay’s 6 and delivered 41 hits to the Lightning’s 26. Those figures do not erase Florida’s loose moments with the puck, but they do explain how a team can spend less time starting with possession and still come away with the better result.

Florida also got steady work in net from both goaltenders used in the game. Cooper Black stopped 14 of 16 shots in 40:00, and Kirill Gerasimyuk turned aside 12 of 13 in 19:36, giving the Panthers 26 saves in total. At the other end, Andrei Vasilevskiy made 20 saves on 24 shots. Special teams never changed the scoreboard: Florida went 0-for-1 on the power play, while Tampa Bay finished 0-for-4. That left this game to even-strength execution, and the Panthers were sharper at the moments that carried the most weight.

Our take: Florida handled the key moments better, and Tampa left itself too much to fix

Our take: the Panthers won because they were sturdier after their mistakes than the Lightning were after theirs. Florida still has details to clean up. The Panthers were charged with 13 giveaways and lost the faceoff battle decisively, so there is a real argument for sharper puck management and cleaner starts to possessions. But they compensated with 18 blocked shots, a 41-hit night, and an instinct for immediate recovery. No recovery was bigger than Reinhardt’s goal six seconds after Harkins tied it.

Our take: Tampa Bay can point to enough good work to avoid treating this as a flat performance. Harkins scored twice, Geekie added the equalizer, Jake Guentzel put up five shots, and John Carlson had four more as the Lightning built a 29-shot total. Still, the missing pieces are hard to ignore because they connect directly to the result. Tampa went 0-for-4 on the power play, was charged with 16 giveaways, and blocked only six shots in a one-goal battle deep into the third. When a team fights back twice, the next shift has to hold. Florida’s did. Tampa Bay’s didn’t, and that was the game.

Scoring moments

1. 1st · 19:44

   Bokondji Imama Goal (1) Deflected, assists: Donovan Sebrango (1), Sam Lafferty (1)

2. 2nd · 2:29

   Kai Schwindt Goal (1) Snap Shot, assists: Cole Reinhardt (1), Mikulas Hovorka (1)

3. 2nd · 3:14

   Jansen Harkins Goal (1) Snap Shot, assists: Ilya Mikheyev (1), J.J. Moser (1)

4. 2nd · 13:09

   Conor Geekie Goal (2) Snap Shot, assists: Sam O'Reilly (2), Benjamin Rautiainen (1)

5. 3rd · 4:21

   Hunter St. Martin Goal (1) Backhand, assists: Alexander Petrovic (1), Kai Schwindt (1)

6. 3rd · 5:29

   Jansen Harkins Goal (2) Snap Shot, assists: Ryan McDonagh (1), Jakob Pelletier (1)

7. 3rd · 5:35

   Cole Reinhardt Goal (3) Snap Shot, assists: none

8. 3rd · 19:36

   Sandis Vilmanis Goal (1) Snap Shot, assists: Uvis Balinskis (1)