Recalled from the AHL earlier in the morning, Zac Dalpe opened the scoring for the Panthers when a dump-in from Aaron Ekblad took a great bounce off the boards and right onto his stick in the slot. With no one but Andrei Vasilevskiy to beat, Dalpe roofed a shot into the top of the cage to make it 1-0 at 3:43 of the first period.
Following a stellar tape-to-tape pass to set up an odd-man look, the Panthers doubled their lead to 2-0 when Aleksi Heponiemi followed up on a shot from Sam Reinhart and buried the ensuing rebound at 18:03.
Setting career-highs in goals (9), assists (30) and points (39) in 56 games with the Charlotte Checkers in the AHL last season, Heponiemi is hoping to spend as much time as possible in South Florida in 2022-23.
"He's just been really good in camp," Panthers coach Paul Maurice said of Heponiemi, who played on the top line tonight. "A prime example of a guy that did what needed to do in camp. He defined himself and kind of described himself by his play. I know him, but I don't. We've used him all over the ice.
"The joke in there is that we're going to play him on defense] next game to see how he looks. He's had an excellent camp. Very, very smart player. He's got a skill level that means he can play with good players and the smarts that he can play up and down the lineup."
In addition to Heponiemi, other up-and-coming players like Logan Hutsko and Matt Kiersted also had strong games. With the Panthers dominating the possession battle to the tune of a 61-32 advantage in shot attempts at 5-on-5, Hutsko led the team with a stellar 91.67 CF%, while Kiersted posted a 68.75%, according to NaturalStatTrick.com.
"Good work by those younger players, those guys that are trying to make the team," Maurice said.
Cutting the deficit in half for the Lightning, Nick Paul put a shot past Sergei Bobrovsky to make it 2-1 at 10:20 of the second period. Tying the game early in the third period, Nikita Kucherov spun around in the right circle before zipping a slick cross-ice feed to Vladislav Namestnikov for a goal to make it 2-2 at 4:16.
Gaining a late power play after Kucherov was whistled for hooking, the Panthers pulled ahead when Montour teed up a pass from Barkov and blasted a shot down the slot from the point right past Vasilevskiy, who was screened by Eetu Luostarinen, to make it 3-2 with 1:15 remaining in regulation.
"Just because of the nicks and bruises, we haven't been able to run the group together," Maurice said of the power play. "Some of the pieces were out there. It was good to get a goal out of that for a little confidence."
In his final start of the preseason, Bobrovsky finished with 26 saves on 28 shots.
"It was a good effort," said Bobrovsky, who won a franchise-record 39 games last season. "I felt good. The team played well. We keep learning the new structure. I thought the guys did a great job. There was good action tonight. I saw the puck well and felt really good."
The Panthers and Lightning will close out the preseason with a rematch at Amalie Arena on Saturday.
After missing tonight's game while nursing minor ailments, several of Florida's regluars such as Sam Bennett, Carter Verhaeghe, Matthew Tkachuk and Nick Cousins are expected to suit up in that game.
"We're going to have a whole bunch of guys come into our lineup," Maurice said.
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