It was a pretty good week for the Tampa Bay Lightning as they took seven out of eight points on their trip out west. Andrei Vasilevskiy picked up three wins, but the engine behind the wins was Nikita Kucherov. The winger put up 6 goals and 7 assists with two of those tallies counting as game-winners. The thirteen points moved him past Connor McDavid in the Art Ross race and garnered him the First Star of the Week Award from the NHL.
The Predators Filip Forsberg, 4 goals, 5 assists, and Montreal’s Cole Caufield, 4 goals, 4 assists, were the second and third Stars respectively. Congratulations to them as well.
It’s the third time this season Kucherov has nabbed the top honor, with his first two coming back-to-back at the end of December and early January. He also has a second star of the week award as well. Oh yeah, and he was the first star of the month for January. So, it’s been a pretty good season for the 32-year-old Russian.
For the season, Kucherov is sitting at 119 points (40 goals, 79 assists). He is two points away from his total from last season and 25 from matching his career-high of 144 (44 goals, 100 assists) set back in the 2023-24 season. His recent scoring binge has propelled him past McDavid (116 points) and Nathan MacKinnon (114 points) despite playing in fewer games than both of them.
The Bolts have three more weeks to go in their season. There is a better than even chance this isn’t the last time we’re seeing his name among the stars.
Other Hockey News
Lightning 24th in Scott Wheeler’s NHL prospect pool rankings [The Athletic]
This is from a few days ago, but the Lightning held steady in Scott Wheeler’s rankings, despite a little shuffling among the the players. Conor Geekie tops the list (hey, ours too!) followed by Sam O’Reilly. Benjamin Rautiainen’s big season propelled him up the list as well.
After successful road trip, Lightning have to start cooking at home [Tampa Bay Times]
There will be plenty of opportunities to see the Lightning at Benchmark Arena over the next few weeks as they play nine of their final thirteen games at home.
Canes to travel to Helsinki for 2026 NHL Global Series [Carolina Hurricanes]
The Canes and the Kraken will face off in back-to-back games this November in Helsinki as the NHL returns to Finland for the first time since 2024 when the Panthers and Stars played in Tampere. The last games in Helsinki were back 2018 when Florida took on Winnipeg.
Ranking the best possible first-round match-ups [ESPN]
There is a 33.25% chance of the Lightning meeting the Canadiens in the first round of the playoffs. The math wizards calculate that series would produce 6.55 goals per game. Sign us up for that!
Backchecking the Bolts [YouTube]
Jason and Justin chat about the Edmonton and Calgary games, preview the home stand, and answer a trivia question.
