Lightning Round: Montreal Canadiens denied capacity increase at Bell Centre

The Stanley Cup Final is moving to Canada after the Tampa Bay Lightning won the first two games of the series at home against the Montreal Canadiens. The Lightning were allowed to increase their capacity to basically full with 18,600 fans allowed into the building. The Canadiens have been allowing 3,500 fans into the Bell Centre since the second round. They asked their government if they could triple their capacity to 10,500, 50% capacity, but this request was denied. [Sportsnet]

“Montreal had hosted 3,500 fans for the entirety of its semifinal series vs. the Vegas Golden Knights after initially being granted permission to welcome 2,500 starting with Game 6 of their first-round series against the Toronto Maple Leafs.”

The Lightning won game two by the score of 3-1. Anthony Cirelli, Blake Coleman, and Ondrej Palat all scored as Andrei Vasilevskiy made over 40 saves for the win. [Raw Charge]

“The Tampa Bay Lightning have won the second game of the Stanley Cup Final by a score of 3-1 over the Montreal Canadiens. The Bolts now hold a 2-0 series lead as they head to Canada to potentially close out the series and yet another NHL season in style. Blake Coleman scored the eventual game-winning goal with a diving, Superman-style swat at the puck that was reminiscent of a goal he scored in last year’s playoffs. Andrei Vasilevskiy saved 42 of 43 shots he faced in a much busier night than in Game 1.”

Cirelli scored? Who could’ve predicted this!

Vasilevskiy’s performance came off missing out on the Vezina Trophy for this season. I’d say he showed them. [NHL dot com]

“What was hard to stomach, however, was watching Andrei Vasilevskiy overlooked for the Vezina Trophy in favor of Marc-Andre Fleury, despite Vasilevskiy finishing with five more wins than the Vegas goalie. The vote was close. Fleury finished with 108 points in voting compared to Vasilevskiy’s 99. Fleury earned 14 first-place votes to Vasilevskiy’s 12. Inexplicably, three NHL GMs didn’t even have Vasilevskiy on their ballot, deeming him unworthy of a first, second or third-place vote.”

The Seattle Kraken are starting to make moves, their first target sounds like it might be Duncan Keith. He is very washed up at this point, but could be a good guy in the room. That said, I don’t think I’d be interested in anyone from Chicago right now. It’s just safer to avoid them at the moment.

Benoit Groulx didn’t end up getting the job in Arizona, as the Coyotes have hired Andre Tourigny to be their new head coach.

Tyler Seguin is selling dog treats!