Florida’s Matthew Tkachuk, left, celebrates with Sam Bennett after Bennett scored an empty-net goal against the New York Rangers during the third period of Game 5 in the Eastern Conference finals  Thursday night in New York, N.Y. Frank Franklin II/Associated Press

NEW YORK — Anton Lundell broke a tie on a deflected shot with 9:38 left and the Florida Panthers moved within a victory of returning to the Stanley Cup Final, beating the New York Rangers 3-2 in Game 5 of the Eastern Conference final Thursday night.

Gustav Forsling and Sam Bennett also scored, and Sergei Bobrovsky made 25 saves to help the Panthers — who lost to Vegas last year in the championship series — win their second straight in the best-of-series series after losing Games 2 and 3 in overtime.

Chris Kreider and Alexis Lafreniere scored for the Rangers, and Igor Shesterkin made 34 saves in another magnificent effort. The Presidents’ Trophy winners need to win two straight to return to the Final for the first time since 2014. Mike Zibanejad had two assists.

The Panthers can end the series Saturday in Florida. If a seventh game is necessary, it will be at Madison Square Garden, where the Panthers have won twice this series.

The go-ahead goal came after the Rangers lost the puck in the Florida end. Eetu Luostarien got the puck, found Lundell at the Rangers’ blue line. His shot from the right circle beat Shesterkin, although it may have hit off the stick of New York defenseman Braden Schneider.

Bennett added an empty-net goal with 1:52 left and it proved necessary when Lafreniere scored with 50 seconds to play. The Rangers never got another shot.

Kreider and Zibanejad, who were scoreless in the first four games of the series, combined to give New York the lead with a short-handed goal at 2:04 of the second period.

Kreider broke up a Florida play at the blue line, nudged the puck to Zibanejad and then took a return pass entering the offensive zone and beat Bobrovsky with nifty backhand move, evoking a roar that seemed to have Madison Square Garden shaking.

It was Kreider eighth goal of the playoffs and the Rangers’ sixth short-handed, tying the team postseason record set in 1978-79. New York went on to the Stanley Cup Final, losing to Montreal in five games.

Forsling tied it a little more than six minutes later, taking a perfect pass from Bennett and beating Shesterkin with a backhander that the goalie deflected but not enough to keep it out of the net. It was the defenseman’s fourth goal and 11th point of the playoffs.

OILERS-STARS: There have been wild swings of momentum in the Western Conference Final, and something that has happened only one other time this late in the NHL playoffs.

After Edmonton and Dallas both came back from multiple-goal deficits to win while splitting the past two games, this is now a best-of-three for a spot in the Stanley Cup Final.

“You look back at this series … there’s four games that Dallas thought they could have won, and we feel there’s four games that we could have won,” Oilers Coach Kris Knoblauch said. “It’s been a good series. I like where we’re going. I like stretches of how we’ve been playing, and it’s just important that we are able to do it for longer stretches.”

Game 5 is Friday night in Dallas.

With a chance to put a stranglehold on the series, Dallas scored twice in the first 5 1/2 minutes on the road in Game 4. Edmonton got even before the first period ended Wednesday night, then scored two more goals 51 seconds apart in the second period on way to a 5-2 win.

“This isn’t supposed to be easy, and it’s not supposed to be pretty,” Dallas Coach Pete DeBoer said.

Well, that scenario looked a lot better for the Stars after winning Game 3. Rogers Place was in a frenzy with Edmonton back home and ahead 2-0 in only 7 1/2 minutes, but Dallas scored three goals in a 3:33 span of the second period and went on to win after its fastest trio of goals in a playoff game.

“They’re going to grab momentum at times in this series. It’s about what we do to go grab it back,” Oilers forward Connor Brown said after assisting on the tie-breaking short-handed goal in Game 4, less than a minute before Leon Draisaitl scored. “We had guys jumping over the boards trying to get the momentum back. Not trying to make a flashy play or anything, just simple, hard, win your battles.”

The only other time in the round before the Stanley Cup Final there were back-to-back games with the winner overcoming multiple-goal deficits was in 1992. That Campbell Conference final also involved Edmonton, which led 2-0 in the first period of Games 2 and 3 before Chicago won both those games on way to a four-game series sweep.

Edmonton led 2-0 in the opener of this series, but needed captain Connor McDavid’s goal 32 seconds into the second overtime to win 3-2. Dallas then went ahead early in Game 2, but captain Jamie Benn’s goal hadn’t even been announced to the home crowd before Brown tied the game 44 seconds later — though the Stars won 3-1.

“I’ve got all the confidence in the world in this group. … Reset here, learn from it. And we’ve got a great opportunity in front of us, a best-of-3 three on home ice,” Benn said after Game 4.

“Two good teams playing and no one’s going to lay down,” Stars forward Joe Pavelski said. “It’s the time of the year, and you’ve got teams that you know can make plays both ways. And it just shows just how fine of a line it is. It comes own to a few plays throughout the night, and can tip games at times.”

• Stars defenseman Chris Tanev, their trade-deadline acquisition, left in the second period Wednesday night after Evander Kane’s shot ricocheted off his lower right leg.

Tanev was in obvious pain when getting to the bench, then had to work through his teammates to get to the tunnel. He never returned to the game, and his status for Game 5 was uncertain.

AWARDS: Carolina Hurricanes defenseman Jaccob Slavin won the NHL’s Lady Byng Memorial Trophy for sportsmanship and gentlemanly conduct for the second time.

Also the 2021 winner, he’s the second defenseman to win it twice, joining Red Kelly, who was a four-time winner, with three coming as a defenseman. From Denver, Slavvin joins Joe Mullen in being the second U.S.-born player to win the Lady Byng award twice.

Slavin was the runaway winner this year in being named on 149 of 194 ballots, with 81 first-place votes, submitted by members of Professional Hockey Writers Association. Vancouver Canucks forward Elias Pettersson finished second, followed by Toronto Maple Leafs forward Auston Matthews.

The 30-year-old Slavin was assessed just eight penalty minutes, the fewest among 81 NHL players who logged at least 1,600 minutes of ice time, and finished second among defenseman with 71 takeaways. He also had a plus-21 plus-minus rating on a Hurricanes team that allowed 216 goals, the fourth-fewest in the league this season.

Slavin had six goals and 31 assists for 37 points in 81 games this season in becoming the franchise career leader among defenseman with 223 assists and 272 points in 665 games.