Florida's ability to stay out of the penalty box will go a long way toward moving on to the second round

Who’s ready for some early afternoon playoff hockey?

The Florida Panthers will embark on their 2024 Stanley Cup Playoff journey when they host the Tampa Bay Lightning in Game 1 of the Eastern Conference Quarterfinals on Sunday at Amerant Bank Arena.

Florida finished the regular season with a 52-24-6 record, good for 110 points and first place in the Atlantic Division.

A late season surge by the Cats – they closed out the schedule on a 5-0-1 run – pushed them past a sputtering Boston Bruins squad just before the teams crossed the finish line.

Now the Panthers are set to open the postseason brimming with confidence and with a fully healthy roster.

They’ll face a Tampa squad that, much like the Panthers last season, used a second half surge to grab one of the wildcard spots. 

The Lightning come into the series with the league’s best power play and a top five penalty kill, now featuring a potent top six that includes a familiar face.

Anthony Duclair has been skating on Tampa’s top line, next to Brayden Point and NHL scoring champion Nikita Kucherov.

While conventional thinking would be to match up the Sasha Barkov line against the Lightning’s top trip, Panthers Head Coach Paul Maurice doesn’t generally play the matchup game.

Both the Barkov line and Anton Lundell’s line have provided elite defending against the best their opponents have had to offer, but you won’t find a weak link on any of Florida’s four lines.

Here are the Panthers projected lines and pairings for Game 1 against Tampa:

Vladimir Tarasenko – Sasha Barkov – Sam Reinhart

Carter Verhaeghe – Sam Bennett – Matthew Tkachuk

Eetu Luostarinen – Anthon Lundell – Evan Rodrigues

Ryan Lomberg – Kevin Stenlund – Nick Cousins

Gus Forsling – Aaron Ekblad

Niko Mikkola – Brandon Montour

Oliver Ekman-Larsson – Dmitry Kulikov

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