Yes, they may have come by way of two penalties and a deflection he knew little about, but Kane is England's talisman and now leads the Golden Boot charts with five.
And as he approaches 100 caps for his country, Japanese cult hero Keisuke Honda again proved his worth for the Blue Samurai, scoring within six minutes of coming off the bench to earn his side a 2-2 draw.
In the process, Honda became the only player to score and assist a goal at each of the last three World Cups.
Villains
It's not really their fault, but World Cup debutants Panama have been found to be woefully out of their depth against the stronger football nations at this tournament.
While they were at least able to hold out Belgium until early in the second half in their first outing, the floodgates opened from the start against England and it was 5-0 at half-time.
The only time a side has conceded more than Panama's nine goals in their first two games at a World Cup was in 1974, when Zaire let in 11 and Haiti 10.
Stat chat
There were 14 goals scored today, the third-most on a single day at the World Cup when three matches or fewer were played. There were 18 goals scored on both 15 June 1982 and 26 June 1954.
At 19 years and eight months, Senegal's Moussa Wagué (who played in the under-20 World Cup here in New Zealand in 2015) became the youngest African goalscorer in World Cup history.
Meantime, in scoring his country's first World Cup goal, Panama's Felipe Baloy at 37 years, 120 days became the third-oldest World Cup goalscorer behind Roger Milla and Gunnar Gren.
Senegal superstar Sadio Mane has now scored in 15 internationals, none of which his country has lost (nine wins, 6 draws).
Harry Kane is the first player since 1958 to score five goals in the first two games at a World Cup.
Across the last two World Cups, no player has scored more goals (six) or provided more assists (four) than Colombia's James Rodriguez.
They said what?
Gary Lineker, former England striker, now football pundit: "What a goal by Lingard. Excellent assist too from Sterling. This is England, right?"
Gareth Southgate, England coach: "I didn't like the start and I didn't like their goal at the end. I guess the bits in the middle were pretty good, but I am being hyper-critical."
Hernan Gomez, Panama coach: "England are totally spectacular, a beautiful team. I went to congratulate him (Southgate) at half-time, I told him I really like his team."
Aliou Cisse, Senegal coach: "Of course we have regrets. We must acknowledge that we didn't see a great Senegalese performance tonight in comparison to the match against Poland. We were not very good frankly, and Japan were the better team, I have to admit that."
Did you know?
England scored as many goals in this game as they managed in their previous seven World Cup matches combined.
Staying and going
England and Belgium join Russia, Uruguay, France and Croatia in the round of 16.
Poland, Panama, Tunisia, Costa Rica, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Morocco and Peru are all headed home after their final group games.
What's next?
The final round of pool games starts tonight, with Groups A and B reaching their conclusions.
Russia and Uruguay battle for top spot in Group A at 2am, while Egypt and Saudi Arabia play only for pride at the same time.
In Group B, two of Spain, Portugal and Iran will go through to the last 16 with the latter two clashing in one game and Spain meeting eliminated Morocco in the other, both at 6am.
Wins for Spain, Portugal or Iran will secure their own passage, while a loss for Iran will see the other two go through.
If Iran beat Portugal, a draw would be enough to see Spain progress.
