The Tampa Bay Lightning, like any great team, have been seeing their talent siphoned off to the rest of the league for the past few years. Either from the salary cap or assistant coaches finding top jobs elsewhere, it’s just how the industry goes.
Like former assistant coach Derek Lalonde in Detroit a couple years back, Jeff Halpern is starting to gain interest from around the league over head coaching jobs. This report from Pierre LeBrun is he’s being interviewed by the Washington Capitals.
Hearing that the Washington Capitals plan to interview Lightning assistant Jeff Halpern at some point here in their head coach search process.
— Pierre LeBrun (@PierreVLeBrun) May 3, 2023
Halpern played over 500 games with the Capitals between the start and end of his career, so it wouldn’t be a shock to see him go back to a place that knows him so well. Also, it was Halpern’s birthday yesterday (today as I’m writing this), so happy birthday, 2x Champ!
If you want to read more on the report, Russian Machine Never Breaks has a thorough story up on their site. Always recommend.
Ian Oland
Eyssimont on his first postseason goal: "Sometimes you have to be a little crafty and it is something I have worked on with Jeff Halpern at these morning skates so I figured I would try it"
— Gabby Shirley (@Gabby_Shirley_) April 28, 2023
Lightning Links
In case you missed it, here are JBB’s exit interview responses from a disappointing season.
Justin Godfrey
The series decider between the Syracuse Crunch and the Rochester Americans is Saturday night! Wind up for it with this game preview from our own Alex!
#SSonFPH | In this episode of the #SyracuseSpeaksPodcast, @FPHCrunch breaks down @SyracuseCrunch's loss in game 4 of the North Division Semifinal series against @AmerksHockey, and previews game 5 this Saturday night:https://t.co/CAPIQbp3Da pic.twitter.com/LpTYTB3QEJ
— Field Pass Hockey (@FieldPassHockey) May 1, 2023
Nick Perbix, Darren Raddysh, and Michael Eyssimont were snubbed for the Calder Trophy as they weren’t announced as the three finalists. Cole Koepke also didn’t quite make it.
2023 Calder Trophy finalists, as voted by @ThePHWA: Matty Beniers (SEA), Owen Power (BUF) and Stuart Skinner (EDM).
— Frank Seravalli (@frank_seravalli) May 3, 2023
What do you do if you’re Montreal Canadiens fans living in Toronto? Buy season tickets and wear the other team’s jersey to every game!
Braydon Holmyard
This was a nice feature on the AHL website.
The @CheckersHockey need look no further than their parent club, the @FlaPanthers, for inspiration as they look to come back from two games down in their playoff series.
📝: @pwilliamsAHL | https://t.co/sKadrTr42S pic.twitter.com/WAw6gM2gfq
— American Hockey League (@TheAHL) May 3, 2023
NHL Playoffs
Carolina Hurricanes 5-1 over New Jersey Devils
CAR leads 1-0
Damn, Carolina really is the team to beat in these playoffs right now. They held the Devils to just 18 shots.
Vegas Golden Knights 6-4 over Edmonton Oilers (Vegas leads 1-0)
For the second night in a row, a player scored four goals only to see his team lose. On Tuesday it was Joe Pavelski and the Stars, last night it was Leon Draisaitl and the Oilers. Chandler Stevenson scored the eventual game-winner in the third period.
Tonight, Toronto and Florida play again. Yanni Gourde and the Seattle Kraken look to win again against the Dallas Stars in the late game.
