Mika Zibanejad scored twice and Igor Shesterkin made 27 saves as the New York Rangers beat the Tampa Bay Lightning 4-0 on Thursday night in the regular-season finale for both teams.
Vincent Trocheck and Chris Kreider also scored for the Rangers, who missed the playoffs a year after winning the Presidents' Trophy as the league's best team.
The Lightning host the defending-champion Florida Panthers in the first game of a first-round Stanley Cup playoff series on Tuesday.
Trocheck scored his 26th goal this season — his sixth short-handed — at 1:02 of the middle period. The Rangers lead the NHL with 18 short-handed goals this season.
Kreider scored at 4:02 of the third to make it 2-0 then Zibanejad scored at 12:50 and 16:24.
The shutout was the sixth this season for Shesterkin, who finished with a career-worst 27-29-5 mark.
The playoff-bound Lightning finished with 47 wins and 102 points.
Lightning netminder Jonas Johansson made 19 saves.
Takeaways
Rangers: New York ended with a 19-19-3 home record. Last season, they were 30-11-0 at Madison Square Garden.
Lightning: Jake Guentzel played his 600th career game. The 30-year-old forward had 41 goals and 39 assists in his first season with the Lightning.
Key moment
Every Ranger wore a blue No. 40 jersey with "Rosen" on the back during warmups to honor Hall of Fame broadcaster Sam Rosen, who called his final game after 40 years as the team's television play-by-play voice. The jerseys also included a patch on the front with Rosen's famous call: "It's a Power Play Goal!"
Key stat
Tampa Bay has made the postseason eight straight seasons and since 2014-15 they lead the league with 146 postseason games and 87 playoff wins. The Lightning won back-to-back Cups in 2020 and 2021 and lost to Colorado in the 2022 Final.
Florida Panthers 'got some confidence' as they prepare to take on Tampa Bay Lightning in Stanley Cup playoffs
The Florida Panthers are back in the playoffs for the sixth year in a row.
And for the second consecutive year, Tampa Bay and the Cats will face off in the first round.
It will be the third time in four seasons that these two Florida teams will meet in the postseason.
The two teams split the series in the regular season with two wins each. However, the Cats know it's going to be a tough fight if they want to advance to the second round.
"We know them really well. They know us really well," said Panthers center Aleksander Barkov said. "The same state rivalry between us and every year is getting bigger and bigger, so it's good. Good for hockey, good for the state of Florida and obviously exciting."
"I think every year is a new year you're going into the playoffs," said Panthers defenseman Gustav Forsling. "We got some confidence. ... It's gonna be a lot of fun, so we're just excited to get started here."
Since 2020, a Florida team has represented the Eastern Conference in the finals. We will see if that streak continues and if the Panthers will be on their way to reclaiming Lord Stanley's Cup.
