Despite another injury-adjusted roster, the Tampa Bay Lightning outlasted the Seattle Kraken to close out their four-game road trip with a 5-1 victory. After Brandon Montour opened the scoring with a power-play goal, the Lightning responded with goals from Brandon Hagel and Brayden Point. A scoreless second period begat another one-goal third period for the Bolts, and they responded with the key goal. It came off the stick of Jake Guentzel on the power play. Brandon Hagel would seal it with an empty-net goal to make it 4-1 before Declan Carlile scored his first NHL goal in the waning minutes of the game.
Making his first start in December, Jonas Johansson stopped 21 of 22 shots to pick up his second victory in a row and made it four out of five starts where the Lightning have picked up at least a point. Despite allowing the early goal, Johansson had one of his best games in a Lightning uniform. Seattle might not have racked up a ton of shots, but the ones they did generate were almost all quality.
Natural Stat Trick had Seattle with 29 scoring chances and 16 high-danger chances. They posted a 3.09 expected goals for, but were held to just the lone goal on the power play. To the Lightning’s credit, the third period was their best in terms of stifling Seattle’s offense.
The Lightning were without the services of Victor Hedman and J.J. Moser as both missed the game due to injuries. Erik Cernak was back on the ice and paired with Ryan McDonagh with the duo playing 15:27 together. Coach Cooper and Jeff Blaishill made sure to spread out the playing time on defense as four of the blueliners logged more than 20 minutes. Cernak, playing in his first game since December 8th, logged a total of 18 minutes and threw 4 hits.
Carlile, who was called up yesterday, was on the ice for 11 minutes (mostly with Darren Raddysh), blocked a couple of shots, and then capped off the night with his first NHL goal as he joined the rush and wristed a shot past Phillipe Grubauer (26 saves on 30 shots).
The Lightning did an excellent job of keeping the puck in the Seattle zone for much of the second and third periods. Give the Kraken some credit. Despite not generating a lot of shots, the offensive surges they put together were of high quality. While the Lightning had a one-goal lead for most of the night, but it never felt really secure. In fact, Seattle came close to tying it a few times. Johansson had to be sharp on several occasions to maintain the lead, but his biggest came on Eeli Tolvanin after a bad puck hand-off led to some scrambling.
Earlier in the second period, Eeli Tolvanen could *not* jam the puck home. Seattle's had their chances. #SeaKraken
— Davy Jones’ Locker Room (@davyjoneslr.bsky.social) December 14, 2024 at 11:55 PM
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Matty Beniers also came close to tying it when he sent a shot off of a 2-on-1 through Johansson and through the crease. Andre Burakovsky had several chances as well that were stoned by JoJo (and the post). Eventually, the Lightning found the key insurance goal, and it came on the power play.
For most of the night, Seattle collapsed down low, preventing Nikita Kucherov from setting up Brayden Point in the bumper position or Jake Guentzel on the far post. Kucherov wasn’t to be denied, and he forced a pass into Point who batted it into the air toward the goal. Guentzel was there to deflect it down past Grubauer for the all important goal.
Brayden Point was credited with the game-winner as he scored his 20th goal of the season. He has needed only 24 games to reach that mark this season, which is the second fastest to reach the mark in franchise history. Steven Stamkos needed just 21 goals in his historic 2010-11 season.
Hagel scored twice to bring his season total to 15 while Nikita Kucherov added two more assists and now has 32 on the season.
With the win, the Lightning finished their road trip with a 3-1 record and their lone loss was a closely contested 2-1 loss to the Edmonton Oilers. They are now 8-6-1 on the road and have climbed back to one point behind the Boston Bruins for third place in the Atlantic Division. They do have a whopping 4 games in hand on the Bruins and could vault up the standings once the schedule evens out a bit.
The Goals:
Brandon Montour (Eeli Tolvanen, Shane Wright) Power Play, 1-0 Kraken
A Monty blast!!! Brandon Montour's shot from the blue line gives the #SeaKraken an early lead and it's a power play goal!
— Davy Jones’ Locker Room (@davyjoneslr.bsky.social) December 14, 2024 at 10:18 PM
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Brandon Hagel (Nick Perbix) 1-1
Tampa Bay scores. Brandon Hagel tips in a shot by Nick Perbix. #SeaKraken
— Davy Jones’ Locker Room (@davyjoneslr.bsky.social) December 14, 2024 at 10:29 PM
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Brayden Point (Darren Raddysh, Jake Guentzel) 2-1 Lightning
Tampa Bay scores again. Grubauer makes the initial save, but an unnamed Tampa Bay forward is on Point for the rebound. #SeaKraken
— Davy Jones’ Locker Room (@davyjoneslr.bsky.social) December 14, 2024 at 10:38 PM
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Jake Guentzel (Brayden Point, Nikita Kucherov) Power Play 3-1 Lightning
Seattle does not kill the Vince Dunn penalty. Jake Guentzel knocks the puck out of mid-air to give the the 'Ning a two-goal lead over the 'Ken #SeaKraken
— Davy Jones’ Locker Room (@davyjoneslr.bsky.social) December 15, 2024 at 12:09 AM
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Brandon Hagel (Nikita Kucherov) Empty Net, 4-1 Lightning
Declan Carlile (Luke Glendening, Mikey Eyssimont) 5-1 Lightning
