For the second straight spring, the Florida Panthers and Tampa Bay Lightning will meet in the Stanley Cup Playoffs. But unlike last year when the Bolts were favored to win the series despite not having a home-ice advantage, the Panthers are the betting favorites for this best-of-7.
Oddsmakers have installed the Cats as -150 favorites, meaning their implied win probability is roughly 60%. As a +130 underdog, oddsmakers imply the Bolts win this series 43.5% of the time. (In sports betting, the house edge, also known as “juice” or vigorish means that the implied probability of a bet will always be over 100%. The amount over 100% is the sportsbook’s edge, or their expected profit.)
Lightning vs. Panthers series odds
Odds provided by BetMGM
Series moneyline: Lightning +120 vs. Panthers -145
Series spread: Lightning +1.5 (-165) vs. Panthers -1.5 (+135)
Lightning vs. Panthers series preview and prediction
Based on the big picture, the Panthers are certainly deserving favorites. Florida was the NHL’s best regular-season team, they set a salary cap era record by scoring 337 goals and no team in the NHL scored more goals, created more expected goals, or generated more high-danger scoring chances at 5-on-5 this season.
But that offensive truck did not really show up in Round 1. And if it did, it at the very least took some time to get going. A lot of credit needs to be given to Washington for that, as the Caps devised a terrific defensive gameplan and executed it well enough to drag Florida to overtime of Game 6 despite mediocre goaltending, but it also brought forward important questions about whether or not the Panthers can win multiple playoff series playing their high-risk, high-reward style.
Florida did pass the first test – and it was a big one considering the franchise hadn’t won a playoff series since 1996 – but didn’t do it with flying colors. Washington proved that the Panthers don’t really have a Plan B, even if their Plan A is terrific.
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And that could be a huge problem for Florida in this matchup. If there’s one thing that the Lightning have proven over the course of their dynasty in the making, it’s that Tampa Bay is comfortable playing any style to get the job done.
Over their last five best-of-7 series wins the Bolts beat the Panthers, Hurricanes, Islanders, Canadiens and Maple Leafs. The Panthers are a high-octane offensive side, the Hurricanes play an all-action, swarm-and-suffocate style, the Isles were a defensive dynamo, the Canadiens were like a poor man’s version of the Islanders with an all-world goaltender and the Maple Leafs were a star-studded juggernaut with very few weaknesses. In other words, no matter what you throw at the Bolts, they’ll be prepared for it.
And that’s why Tampa Bay is a bit of an outlier when it comes to handicapping. While the Lightning’s overall numbers from the regular season are strong, they don’t pop off the page at you as they do for other elite teams like Toronto, Florida or Colorado. Tampa finished the regular season with the ninth-best expected goals rate, seventh-best high-danger chance rate, and sixth-best goal differential at 5-on-5. In other words, their season-long metrics paint them as one of the “best of the rest” rather than the “best of the best.”
But we know by now that the Lightning are the “best of the best,” no matter what the numbers and models tell us.
What Tampa Bay did in Round 1 was impressive for a number of reasons. First of all, the Maple Leafs looked like a real threat to win the Stanley Cup all season long and they didn’t look out of form at all during the seven-game set with the Bolts. In fact, Toronto played that series as well as you could reasonably expect and the Lightning still found a way to not only win, but come back in the series three different times to do so.
None of this is to say that the Panthers are undeserving of their status as favorites in Round 2. Florida was the better team during the regular season, has a home-ice advantage and the Lightning could be without Brayden Point for some time. But just because a team deserves to be the favorite doesn’t mean it is the right side from a betting perspective.
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The Panthers truly struggled with the Capitals. By the end of the series, Florida outscored the Caps, 18-10, at 5-on-5 but the underlying metrics paint the series as a virtual toss-up. Florida barely created more expected goals (13.3 to 12.5) and conceded a few more high-danger scoring chances (60 to 57) at 5-on-5. While you shouldn’t throw away 82 games of data just because a team looked ordinary in a six-game sample size, those numbers do carry some water since the Panthers led the NHL in creating expected goals and high-danger chances during the regular season.
The Panthers remain a threat to win the Stanley Cup and they’ve earned the right to be favorites over the Lightning in this series. That said, this number is too high on Tampa. The Lightning are a tougher out than the Capitals and we just saw Florida had its hands full with the Caps in Round 1.
Lightning vs. Panthers series prediction
Tampa Bay to win the series +130 (Caesars Sportsbook)
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