Brayden Point notched his team-leading 42nd goal and had two assists, and Tampa Bay topped the Florida Panthers 5-1 in the Lightning’s regular-season home finale on Tuesday night.
Tampa Bay (47-26-8, 102 points) got goals from Conor Geekie, Jake Guentzel, Nikita Kucherov (assist) and Darren Raddysh as it earned points for the sixth straight game (3-0-3).
Victor Hedman and Yanni Gourde had two helpers each, and goaltender Andrei Vasilevskiy had 23 saves as the club finished 29-8-4 at home.
However, the first-place Toronto Maple Leafs were in Buffalo and beat the Sabres 4-0 to give them 106 points, claiming the Atlantic Division and earning them a Battle of Ontario first-round date against the No. 1 wild-card-winning Ottawa Senators.
Meanwhile, the Lightning will have home-ice advantage over the Panthers in another regional rivalry against their in-state rival down by the bay.
Florida (47-31-4, 98 points) ended its season on a two-game losing streak and was 3-6-1 in its past 10 matches. Brad Marchand scored in his 1,100th NHL game, and backup goalie Vitek Vanecek stopped 26 shots.
The Panthers beat the Lightning in five games in a first-round series last season on the way to their first Stanley Cup championship.
Point did not take long to give the Lightning crowd something to cheer about in the home finale. He skated in from the left side and blasted a shot by Vanecek just 92 seconds in to increase his team lead.
After each team killed off a power play, Point did the dishing out by feeding Geekie, who smoked a one-timer from the right circle at 15:25 for a 2-0 lead.
Playing in his 599th career game, Guentzel beat Vanecek from the low slot for goal No. 41, a short-handed one at 18:09 as Tampa Bay held a three-goal lead after 20 minutes.
Kucherov finished a clever pass from Point at 4:42 for his 37th tally, but Marchand put Florida on the board less than a minute later with his second goal with his new club.
In the third period, Raddysh posted the final tally with a five-on-three power-play marker at 11:22.
–Field Level Media
