Vasilevskiy Makes 33 Saves As Lightning Beat Panthers 5-1 To Cut Florida's Series Lead To 2-1

The Tampa Bay Lightning were in an early hole against the Florida Panthers, again.

In the first two games of their first-round playoff series, that spelled disaster for Tampa Bay.

Not this time.

The Lightning turned the deficit into a rout in Game 3, beating the Panthers 5-1 Saturday and tightening the series to 2-1.

Andrei Vasilevskiy was nearly perfect, stopping 33 of 34 shots, and the Lightning got goals from Jake Guentzel, Brayden Point, Nick Paul and Luke Glendening. Anthony Cirelli added an empty-netter with five minutes left, and Nikita Kucherov had three assists.