Panthers can eliminate Lightning, Capitals look to close out Canadiens and Blues-Jets reaches Game 5

The top seed in the Eastern Conference and the defending Stanley Cup champion can advance to the second round of the playoffs on Wednesday night while the NHL s best club in the regular season resumes a first-round playoff series that is proving to be tougher than a large number of expected The Washington Capitals return home on the verge of knocking out the Montreal Canadiens The Florida Panthers are also up - and play at Tampa Bay looking to eliminate the rival Lightning for a second consecutive year In the West the Presidents Trophy-winning Winnipeg Jets are back home against the St Louis Blues with the best-of-seven series tied - Washington has not won a series since hoisting the Cup in and a decade removed from the last time it won a competition at home to move on We re not looking years back stated winger Tom Wilson one of just three players left from We want to keep this machine rolling in here We want to keep these guys dialed in You invariably want to win on home ice you invariably want to win every challenge We ll be extremely motivated Similarly the loaded Panthers are trying to keep the same consistent approach that helped them erase a third-period deficit to win Meeting They re on the verge of winning their eighth of nine series since The style we re trying to play is one that shouldn t matter with the total in the series explained forward Sam Reinhart who s tied for the club s postseason scoring lead We re trying play aggressive we re trying to take their time and space away and play on our toes Montreal Canadiens at Washington Capitals When Where to Watch Encounter Wednesday p m EDT ESPN Series Capitals lead - The Capitals could be getting -goal-scorer Aliaksei Protas back after missing more than three weeks with a skate cut on his left foot Protas has been full-go in practice looks ready and the -foot- -pound forward might be just the guy to help his gang finish the job against the smaller less experienced Canadiens Our size and weight and height and weight would go up quite significantly center Pierre-Luc Dubois explained To get Pro back would mean a lot to this group He s been one of our most of consistent players all season does a lot of good things for us on and on the penalty kill so it d be great to have him back With or without Protas Washington will lean on its winning recipe and fired-up crowd hoping that makes up for Montreal s desperation You know that their season s on the line and there s no quit from that club over there goaltender Logan Thompson declared We know they re going to come out real hard and we know they re going to be playing for their lives so we ve got to match their power Florida Panthers at Tampa Bay Lightning When Where to Watch Championship Wednesday p m EDT ESPN Series Panthers lead - The hits just keep on coming Big hits too It started with Tampa Bay s Brandon Hagel on Florida s Aleksander Barkov in Contest continued with the Panthers Matthew Tkachuk on the Lightning s Jake Guentzel in Battle and the latest to draw attention was the Event greeting that Florida s Aaron Ekblad gave to Hagel Ekblad was facing a attainable suspension and Hagel has been ruled out with a head injury Lightning coach Jon Cooper noted he s tired of talking about the hits with the Lightning needing three wins in a row to avoid elimination The Lightning have nine goals in the series five in their Challenge win and four in the their three losses combined Not only has back-to-back NHL scoring champion Nikita Kucherov not had a goal in this series none in his last playoff games but the Panthers have limited him to five shots in just over minutes of ice time Florida knows delivering the knockout blow will be demanding Tampa Bay won of playoff series from through The Lightning are on the brink of losing four consecutive series and three in the first round for the first time in franchise history There is a slightly different emotion coming into an elimination championship for both teams Panthers coach Paul Maurice announced You want to avoid that emotion St Louis Blues at Winnipeg Jets When Where to Watch Challenge Wednesday p m EDT ESPN Series Tied - The Jets won the first two games at home The Blues held serve in St Louis to even things up Something s got to give with the series shifting back to Winnipeg We knew we had to win there eventually if we re going to win this series stated Blues forward Jake Neighbours who has a goal and four assists We re confident that we stack up well against them The Blues have outscored the Jets - chasing Vezina Trophy-favorite goaltender Connor Hellebuyck twice in winning - in Championship and - in Contest Hellebuyck who has a goals-against average and save percentage after and during the regular season vowed I am going to be better Winnipeg won Competition by a sum of - and Encounter in a tight - nail-biter St Louis coach Jim Montgomery is confident because of how his crew played in defeat on the road We felt we were in both games right til the bitter end in Winnipeg and that we did not play to our identity for minutes Montgomery announced We feel if we do that we re going to give ourselves a real good opportunity to have success and win it AP Sports Writer Tim Reynolds in Fort Lauderdale Florida and AP freelance writer David Solomon in Centene Missouri contributed AP NHL playoffs https apnews com hub stanley-cup and https apnews com hub NHL Source