Do the Bolts remain the away team?

Stanley Cup Playoffs 2nd Round – here we go! Two absolute top favourites for the title kick off the second round. The best team of the regular season receives the reigning champions and it should be a close and high-scoring series.

At least at the beginning of the series, there could be a rattle on the scoreboard as two of the best offenses of the regular season meet. The last two duels against each other ended 9:3 in favour of Florida and 4:8 in favour of the Lightning.

As far as the series is concerned, everything is open. Both teams will have games that are a bit more clear-cut, but whoever wants to be successful in the end has to win the close games – the overtime games. After all, that’s how both teams got to this second round in the first place.

For Game 1, our forecast for Florida vs. Tampa Bay is a high-scoring game in which both offenses want to show what they can do. The goal count should then drop from game to game, but for Tuesday we wouldn’t be surprised to see both teams score at least three goals or more.

Florida Panthers – Statistics & current form

With 4:2 the Panthers defeated the Caps in the end quite clearly. At least compared to most of the other series in this breathtaking first round. Five of the eight series were decided in Game 7 – an NHL record.

Two of the Panthers’ last three wins came after overtime, which should give them extra confidence for the coming rounds. With the Lightning, they now face a team that can be described as champions of close games themselves.

At what point do the Panthers start thinking more defensively?

One question on the minds of all NHL observers is whether the Panthers can play defense. With 4.11 goals per game, they were by far the best offence in the regular season and in the playoffs they are already at 3.33 goals per game.

However, they also concede 3.17 goals per game, which will be too much in the long run in the postseason. The top teams in the West like Calgary or Colorado are at 2.00 and 2.25 goals against in the playoffs, which is over one goal less.

Will it come down to a goalie duel?

This defensive mediocrity could yet break their neck in the course of the postseason. Therefore, goalie Sergey Bobrovsky will still have an important role to play. If he can increase his save percentage from 90.6% so far to over 91%, that would be enormously important.

Otherwise, the Panthers could lose out on their high-scoring games. For Tuesday, we recommend betting on over-points for the Panthers vs. the Lightning. Here we trust both teams to easily score over 2.5 goals.

Key Players:
G: Sergei Bobrovsky
D: Mackenzie Weegar
D: Aaron Ekblad
LW: Carter Verhaeghe
C: Aleksander Barkov
RW: Anthony Duclair

Tampa Bay Lightning – Statistics & current form

The Tampa Bay Lightning have once again managed to decide a series through their experience. Against the almost pitiful Maple Leafs, they prevailed 2-1 in Toronto. Even if they don’t seem quite as unstoppable as in the two years before – Tampa is a force to be reckoned with.

Another yardstick is now the duel with the Panthers, the best team of the preliminary round. They also scored an impressive 0.63 goals more per game than Tampa, with a comparable defence (2.95 to 2.78 goals conceded per game).

Playoff experience speaks for the Bolts

So from the stats, the Lightning are also behind the Panthers. That was the case in the Regular Season and is now also the case in the Post Season. Nevertheless, there are a few points that clearly speak for Tampa. The two main advantages are their experience and their special teams.

If you can lift the Cup twice in a row, you don’t have to hide from anyone, which was clearly evident in the confidence of Game 7 against the Leafs. It should be similar now in the close games in this series.

In addition, the Bolts have the much better stats on the over and under game. On the powerplay they score 21.2%, which is not outstanding either, but still better than the Panthers’ 0.00%. On the penalty kill, their advantage is also substantial at 85.7% to 70.8%.

Betting alternatives are needed

With just about every upcoming duel likely to come down to a 50-50 match, win bets are a gamble in every sense of the word. However, since the Bolts are considered the underdogs for now, betting on them is an option.

Nevertheless, it is always a matter of reassessing for this matchup. For Game 1 now, we expect a very fast game, which makes the odds on over-points, especially on goals for Tampa interesting in Florida vs Tampa.

Key Players:
G: Andrei Vasilevskiy
D: Victor Hedman
D: Jan Rutta
LW: Ondrej Palat
C: Brayden Point
RW: Nikita Kucherov

Florida Panthers – Tampa Bay Lightning Head-to-head comparison / H2H record

This series starts at 0-0 and the four games this regular season have also been split fraternally at 2-2. The Panthers might have gotten a push from their first playoff series win since 1995, the Bolts from their razor-thin Game 7 win over Toronto.

Again, the two teams don’t take much away from each other. However, it was noticeable in the direct duels this season that defence also took a back seat there. The last two meetings ended with extremely high scores of 9:3 and 4:8.

On average, 8.0 goals were scored in the four duels this season, which also makes over-points an interesting option for Tuesday. For those who prefer to play with win bets, we recommend a tip on the Lightning in Florida vs. Tampa, which brings in the significantly higher value.

Florida Panthers – Tampa Bay Lightning Tip

The Panthers are considered the favourites in this series. However, since we are predicting a 50-50 series, bets on the Bolts are generally a bit more recommended – same for Tuesday.

No.1 bet for this Game 1, however, is predicting Tampa Bay to score over 3.0 goals in Panthers vs. Lightning. Especially against the high scoring but low defending team of the Panthers, these three goals should be achieved at least.

As a betting alternative, we see a bet on a scoring point from Nikita Kucherov in this game. The scored four times in his last four playoff games and he is always hot against Florida in particular (2 goals and 3 assists in April’s win). Attractive betting odds can also be picked up on Florida Panthers vs. Tampa Bay Lightning