The Tampa Bay Lightning still hold the hammer entering Game 6 against the Florida Panthers on Wednesday night — but at least the Panthers have some momentum on their side.

Florida staved off elimination on Monday night by taking Game 5 with a 4-1 thanks in part to some elite netminding by 20-year-old rookie goalie Spencer Knight.

The Panthers are going to need a similar, perhaps even better, performance on Wednesday.

The Lightning can end the Panthers season with a win at Amalie Arena.

The Panthers continue to take things as they come.

A win would force a winner-take-all Game 7 on Friday night in Sunrise.

“One game at a time here,’’ MacKenzie Weegar said. “We’re going into a tough building, they play well at home. We’ve got to keep the momentum on our side and play our best game.”

The Lightning felt Florida’s intensity in Game 5 and know it has to match it in Tampa.

“We’ve got to be much hungrier,’’ Victor Hedman said Tuesday. “We are playing a great team that was on the brink of elimination and they played like it. We didn’t match that.’’

The Panthers did a good job Monday of staying out of the penalty box and keeping the Lightning’s electric power play at bay.

Tampa Bay really only had one kick at the power play in Game 5 and did everything but score.

Thank Knight for that.

The Lightning kept the puck in the Florida zone not only for the entirety of the power play, but extended it for about 15 seconds as well.

Knight ended up making five saves on the power play chance in the first period. Florida trailed 1-0 at the time and could have found itself in an even bigger hole. Instead, Knight kept things right where they were.

Tampa took 22 shots in the first period alone.

“We came into the room saying, ‘man are we lucky’,” Joel Quenneville said. “Knighter put on a clinic and gave us a chance. That was our worst period in a long time.”

The Panthers cannot afford that sort of start, not in such a hostile environment.

Say what you want about Knight’s poise in net, but Wednesday will be a different animal. He hasn’t played in front of a crowd as crazed as the one he will in Tampa in a long time — if ever.

The Panthers have faith the former Boston College star has the chops for this.

While Knight was supposed to just get one start after signing in late March, his performance not only in his debut game against Columbus but in practice each day gave the Panthers confidence he could handle a few more starts.

When Chris Driedger got hurt, Quenneville gave the ball to his rookie.

Knight became the youngest goalie in NHL history to start his career 4-0 and is the youngest to win a playoff elimination game.

Florida would love to see him win his second.

And then a third in Game 7 on Friday night.

That’s looking a little too far ahead.

“His whole career coming up, then joining us this year gave every indication he’s capable of doing it,” Quenneville said. “Now it’s just an opportunity. Right off the bat, his composure gave you every indication he’s capable of handling any situation. We were in a situation where, hey, we’ve got nothing to lose, so let’s go in there and have some fun with it. He did. He was great. That was a goalie win.’’

— The Panthers did not play Keith Yandle a whole lot Monday night after he got turned in the opening minute which led to a 2-on-1 rush that the Lightning got a goal on.

Yandle found himself playing just two shifts in a third period where the Panthers were trying to shut things down defensively. One of those shifts came as part of the second power play unit.

In Wednesday’s morning skate, Radko Gudas was missing but expected to play since assistant coach Derek MacKenzie played his role as a placeholder. Markus Nutivaara was back with Brandon Montour after missing the past two days.

So, it appears Yandle will be scratched for the third time in the past four games.

2021 STANLEY CUP PLAYOFFS

ROUND 1

TAMPA BAY LIGHTNING VS. FLORIDA PANTHERS

TAMPA BAY LEADS 3-2 IN BEST-OF-7 SERIES

GAME 6

PROJECTED FLORIDA PANTHERS LINEUP

FLORIDA FORWARDS

23 Carter Verhaeghe — 16 Sasha Barkov — 19 Mason Marchment

11 Jonathan Huberdeau — 9 Sam Bennett — 74 Owen Tippett

91 Anthony Duclair — 21 Alex Wennberg — 70 Patric Hornqvist

94 Ryan Lomberg — 55 Noel Acciari — 77 Frank Vatrano

FLORIDA DEFENSEMEN

52 MacKenzie Weegar — 6 Anton Stralman 

65 Markus Nutivaara — 62 Brandon Montour

42 Gus Forsling — 7 Radko Gudas

FLORIDA GOALIES

30 Spencer Knight

60 Chris Driedger

Reserves: G Sergei Bobrovsky, D Keith Yandle, D Kevin Connauton, F Aleksi Heponiemi, F Grigori Denisenko, F Juho Lammikko, F Eetu Luostarinen, D Matt Kiersted, F Nikita Gusev, F Lucas Wallmark, D Chase Priskie, D Lucas Carlsson, D John Ludvig, D Vladislav Kolyachonok, D Kevin Connauton, F Cole Schwindt, F Scott Wilson, G Sam Montembeault, G Philippe Desrosiers, D Brady Keeper

Injured: D Noah Juulsen (UBI, TBD); D Aaron Ekblad (leg, out this series)

Florida power play (6/20 30% — T-3rd in NHL)

PP1: Sasha Barkov, Jonathan Huberdeau, Patric Hornqvist, Sam Bennett, Carter Verhaeghe

PP2: Alex Wennberg, Anthony Duclair, Frank Vatrano, Brandon Montour, MacKenzie Weegar

Florida penalty kill (10/17 58.8% — 15th in NHL)

PROJECTED TAMPA BAY LIGHTNING LINEUP

TAMPA BAY FORWARDS

18 Ondrej Palat — 21 Brayden Point — 86 Nikita Kucherov

17 Alex Killorn — 71 Anthony Cirelli  — 91 Steven Stamkos 

79 Ross Colton — 37 Yanni Gourde — 20 Blake Coleman

14 Pat Maroon — 9 Tyler Johnson — 7 Mathieu Joseph

TAMPA BAY DEFENSEMEN

77 Victor Hedman — 44 Jan Rutta

27 Ryan McDonagh — 81 Erik Cernak

98 Mikhail Sergachev — 58 David Savard

TAMPA BAY GOALIES

88 Andrei Vasilevskiy

35 Curtis McElhinney

Tampa Bay power play (7/17 41.2% — 2nd in NHL)

PP1: Ondrej Palat, Brayden Point, Nikita Kucherov, Steven Stamkos, Victor Hedman

PP2: Alex Killorn, Anthony Cirelli, Yanni Gourde, Tyler Johnson, Mikhail Sergachev

Tampa Bay penalty kill (14/20 70% — T-13th in NHL)