It’s safe to say there’s still plenty of bad blood to go around in the Sunshine State.
PublishedFebruary 6, 2026 10:00 AM EST•UpdatedFebruary 6, 2026 9:43 AM EST
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Stop me if you’ve heard this one before, but the Florida Panthers and Tampa Bay Lightning are not too fond of one another.
The Atlantic Division-leading Lightning and the defending Stanley Cup champion Panthers closed out their season series in brutal fashion, both on the scoreboard and in the penalty box.
Tampa Bay crushed its in-state rivals 6-1 on Thursday night, and although the Cats were a shell of themselves – dealing with a bevy of injuries – they didn’t go down without a fight.
Literally.
The headliner is obviously Brandon Hagel vs. Matthew Tkachuk, a fight that has global implications from the past and for the immediate future.
READ: I Regret To Inform You That South Florida Is Now A Hockey Town
Hagel and Tkachuk were famous for their tilt in last February’s Four Nations Faceoff, with the Canadian and American, respectively, dropping the gloves nearly seconds into their round-robin match.
Clearly, international relations haven’t thawed much between the two, and with the Olympics set to start in less than a week, there’s a good chance we could see a decisive round three between these two gladiators.
The most underrated tilt of the all-out on-ice melee was Gustav Forsling absolutely feeding JJ Moser his teeth.
It looks like Forsling may have just gotten his wires crossed and went ballistic at first, but upon further inspection, it looks like this beatdown might be warranted.
Regardless, we can chalk up another Battle of Florida as a massive success, with both teams leaving it all – and then some – out on the ice.
I’ve said it before, and I will say it again: this is becoming one of the best rivalries the sport has to offer, and Thursday night showed us why.
As far as the on-ice part of things, Tampa looks like the best and hottest team in the league.
Tampa is 19-1-1 in its last 21 games and has a +59 goal differential, second only to Colorado in the entire NHL.
On the flip side, the Panthers look like they are in serious danger of missing the playoffs for the first time in more than half a decade, something I started to fear would happen as recently as last month.
While that would be a massive disappointment after winning back-to-back Stanley Cups, it would appear as though the extra hockey and injuries finally caught up to the Cats.
If this is the last time these two teams meet – there is a slight chance if the Panthers make the playoffs that they will face off against the Lightning – then what a send-off it was.
With a combined 793 penalty minutes between the two teams this season, it’s safe to say there’s still plenty of bad blood to go around in the Sunshine State.
