TAMPA, Fla. -- The Florida Panthers can advance to the second round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs with a win against the Tampa Bay Lightning at Amalie Arena on Wednesday (7:30 p.m. ET; FDSNSUN, SCRIPPS, ESPN2, TVAS2, SN360).
The Panthers stunned the Lightning in Game 4 with two late goals. Aaron Ekblad and Seth Jones scored 11 seconds apart with less than four minutes remaining to give Florida the lead and a commanding 3-1 advantage in the best-of-7 series.
"You're trying to end someone's season," Panthers forward Carter Verhaeghe said. "Any time you're trying to end someone's season, they're playing free, they have nothing to lose. They're down three games. They battled all year, they had a really good year. They're not going to go down easy, that's for sure."
But extending the series will be more challenging for the Lightning with the absence of forward Brandon Hagel, who has been ruled out of Game 5 after he was elbowed by Ekblad in Game 4, a play that resulted in Ekblad receiving a two-game suspension from the NHL Department of Player Safety.
Ekblad was also out for Games 1 and 2 while serving the final two games of his 20-game suspension for violating the terms of the NHL/NHLPA Performance Enhancing Drug Program; the Panthers won each game.
The series has ramped up in intensity as it has gone on, with two suspensions already. Hagel was suspended by the Department of Player Safety for Game 3 for a hit on Panthers captain Aleksander Barkov during Game 2. Panthers forward Matthew Tkachuk followed that in Game 3 with a hit on Lighting forward Jake Guentzel that did not receive supplemental discipline. Then in Game 4, following the Ekblad hit on Hagel, Florida defenseman Niko Mikkola received a game misconduct 19 seconds into the third period for boarding Tampa Bay forward Zemgus Girgensons.
Now, with elimination on the line, it comes down to the play on the ice. And the Lightning have to find their offense before it's too late.
"Get in front of the goalie and get more shots," forward Nick Paul said. "I think it starts with our forecheck and turning pucks over. And then from there, just taking it to the net. Not trying to overpass, just get pucks on net and bodies to the net to try to get a rebound goal."
Teams that lead 3-1 in a best-of-7 series have an all-time series record of 317-32 (.908). The Lightning are 16-13 all-time in games when they're facing elimination, including 8-5 at home. The Panthers are 11-9 in potential series-clinching games, including 5-5 on the road.
Here is a breakdown of Game 5:
Panthers: They can become the first defending Stanley Cup champion to make it past the opening round since the Lightning in 2022. Tkachuk has seen his ice time increase in each game. He played 11:43 in Game 1 after missing the final 25 games of the regular season because of a lower-body injury, 13:31 in Game 2, 16:10 in Game 3 and 16:32 in Game 4. With Ekblad out, Uvis Balinskis will return to the lineup. He played 76 games in the regular season and the first two games of this series when Ekblad was out because of suspension. The Panthers, who won both games at Amalie Arena in the series, are 17-8 on the road during the playoffs over the past three seasons.
Lightning: Tampa Bay needs more out of its top scorers after the team was the highest-scoring in the NHL during the regular season (3.56 goals per game). Only Guentzel and Brayden Point have more than one goal in the series (each has two), and Nikita Kucherov has zero. The Lightning are 1-for-15 on the power play, having scored a goal in their first power-play attempt and none in the 14 chances since Game 1.
Number to know: 5-0. When facing elimination for the first time in a series, the Lightning are unbeaten in their previous five opportunities.
What to look for: With another suspension, does each team temper its outside-the-lines play in this one? How does the Lightning's offense respond to the urgency of being on the brink of elimination? Can the Panthers keep coming in waves, as they have all series, taking the Lightning off their game?
What they are saying
"It seems like the urgency level is heightened. And the team has the same thought process of, who knows, this could be your last shift. So usually that brings a lot out of guys. You just don't want them to be in a situation where they're antsy or not making plays they normally make. In the end, it's still another hockey game. It just happens to be the fifth game against the exact same team." -- Lightning coach Jon Cooper
"You're going to get desperation more from the opposing team than you probably have [before], but we're a desperate team as well. We want to finish this and finish it the right way and then play our game. With that being said, we've always had it in our heads, going through our experience the past few years, our style is like a seven-game series style. So no matter what happens out there, the score, the time of the game, we're playing every game like it's that seven-game mindset." -- Panthers forward Matthew Tkachuk
Panthers projected lineup
Carter Verhaeghe -- Aleksander Barkov -- Sam Reinhart
Evan Rodrigues -- Sam Bennett -- Matthew Tkachuk
Eetu Luostarinen -- Anton Lundell -- Brad Marchand
A.J. Greer -- Nico Sturm -- Jesper Boqvist
Gustav Forsling -- Seth Jones
Niko Mikkola -- Dmitry Kulikov
Uvis Balinskis -- Nate Schmidt
Sergei Bobrovsky
Vitek Vanecek
Scratched: Tomas Nosek, Jonah Gadjovich, Jaycob Megna, Mackie Samoskevich
Injured: None
Suspended: Aaron Ekblad
Lightning projected lineup
Jake Guentzel -- Brayden Point -- Nikita Kucherov
Nick Paul -- Anthony Cirelli -- Gage Goncalves
Conor Geekie -- Yanni Gourde -- Mitchell Chaffee
Zemgus Girgensons -- Luke Glendening
Victor Hedman -- J.J. Moser
Ryan McDonagh -- Erik Cernak
Emil Lilleberg -- Nick Perbix
Darren Raddysh
Andrei Vasilevskiy
Jonas Johansson
Scratched: Cam Atkinson, Max Crozier
Injured: Oliver Bjorkstrand (lower body), Brandon Hagel (undisclosed)
Status report
Ekblad, a defenseman, will serve the first of his two-game suspension for elbowing Hagel, a forward, who also will not play. Balinskis, who played the first two games of the series, will replace Ekblad in the lineup. ... Cirelli and Hedman did not participate in morning skate (maintenance) but will be in the lineup. ... Crozier, a defenseman, was recalled from Syracuse of the American Hockey League on Wednesday.
