The good thing about a loss like the one the Tampa Bay Lightning suffered on Thursday night to the Chicago Bedards, is that it is only one loss. Yes, it’s two points wasted, but it only lasts for the night. Hopefully, the Lightning can erase the memory of the disastrous 5-minute stretch of play that saw Chicago score three times on their way to a 5-3 victory. Connor Bedard had his first multi-point game with two goals and two assists. Former Lightning players Corey Perry and Tyler Johnson also scored in their return to Amalie Arena.
Goals from Anthony Cirelli, Nikita Kucherov, and Steven Stamkos weren’t enough as the Lightning suffered their first regulation loss at home this season.
First Period:
A bad stretch of pay at the end of the opening 20 minutes unraveled a rather dominant period for the Lightning. At 5v5 your would have thought the Bolts would have had another 4-goal first period as they had 80% of the scoring chances, 71.43% of the high-danger chances, and 70.27% of the attempted shots, yet the scoreboard read 4-2 after 20 minutes. Take that, fancy stats.
Why was it so bad?
Turnovers. That’s it. That was the great equalizer. Turnovers led directly to three of the goals (and the other one was an unlucky bounce off of a skate). No matter how great the talent gap is between teams, if one of them is just going to hand chances to the other, it’s going to be a long night.
Things started off great as the puck spent a lot of time in the Chicago zone. Walterri Merela drove to the net and drew a penalty. On the power play, it was Anthony Cirelli who slammed one through the pads of Petr Mraezk.
If you need evidence that size matters not in this game, check out the game-tying goal from Connor Bedard. After Philipp Kurashev picked off the Lightning pass behind the boards, Bedard (5’10”, 185 lbs.) got in front of the net and held off Victor Hedman (6’6″, 244 lbs.) to tap the puck into the net.
Okay, no problem, just get back to cycling the puck and get that goal back. Which the Lightning did as Tanner Jeannot scuffed a shot towards the net. It was going wide, but Nikita Kucherov was just hanging around the side of the net. He dug the puck out of his skates and wristed it to the back of the net. When you’re hot – the puck finds you.
The Bolts hounded the puck in the offensive zone and limited the time and space the young ‘Hawks had. That’s exactly what you should do against an inexperienced team. Don’t give them time to make decisions. However, hockey is a fluky game and even when you’re dominating a period, breaks can go against you.
The Lightning lost a defensive zone payoff and the ‘Hawks moved the puck around to another teenager, Kevin Korchinski. He let it fly and Darren Raddysh, who was doing the right thing in boxing out his opponent, left his skate in an inopportune spot. The puck glanced off of it and Johansson had no chance.
Okay, that’s fine. Bad breaks happen. What shouldn’t happen is putting the puck on a tee for a team that is struggling to score. Calvin de Haan tried to force a puck into the zone just after he crossed center ice. Chicago knocked it down and broke the other way. Bedard backhanded a pass to old friend Tyler Johnson who buried it for his first goal against his former team.
It probably won’t go down as a turnover, but Kucherov lost a 50/50 chance at a puck and Bedard snagged the puck and dished it over to Nick Foligno. The veteran nutmegged Erik Cernak with the pass and Bedard redirected it onto Johansson’s pads. What a save! Well, it was until a backchecking Cirelli tumbled into the net and kicked the puck over the goal line. Crash the net at the other end, Tony.
Second Period:
Down by two early on, the last thing the Lightning wanted to do was go shorthanded, even against a team that’s only connecting on 10% of their power plays this year. So, a minute into the period Tanner Jeannot whacked Bedard across the side of his face for a double-minor. Not the best penalty to take.
To make it even worse, the ‘Hawks made them pay as Corey Perry redirected a pass from yes, you guessed it, Connor Bedard to make it 5-2. For a moment it looked like the goal might have been Bedard’s, so some overly enthusiastic Chicago fans tossed their caps onto the ice. Sorry, buds, you wasted your hat on an assist. Go buy a new one in the gift shop.
From there, the Bolts struggled to get into gear. Johansson did his best to keep them in the game, making several sharp saves, but Tampa Bay just couldn’t get sustained pressure int the Chicago end until late in the period. When they did Petr Mrazek was there to make the save. The best chance for the Bolts came on a point-blank shot by Stamkos that the goaltender swallowed up easily.
Third Period:
If you watched this period, do you remember anything about it from the first 15 minutes? For a team that was down three goals on home ice to a team at the bottom of the standings the only thing really noticeable was that they weren’t doing enough to claw their way back into the game.
Two power plays yielded absolutely nothing. Even-strength play yielded nothing. Calvin de Haan took a shot that was saved by Mrazek at the 4:54 mark. The Lightning wouldn’t record another shot on goal until Brayden Point put on net at the 16:01 mark. Oh, and the Bolts had a power play during that stretch. Just not good enough when down multiple goals.
They did get one back with just over two minutes to go. Coach Cooper had pulled Johansson (who finished with 24 saves) with more than five minutes to go in the game. After some lackluster attempts at setting up in the zone, Point finally got a shot on net. Cirelli tipped the loose puck over to Stamkos, who swatted it home for his fifth goal of the season.
Any chance of a comeback died with the refs whistle after Hedman interfered with Foligno. The Big Swede took a big swing at the boards with his stick, drawing an unsportsmanlike penalty. Cirelli was also assessed a 10-minute misconduct after the call.
So, not a great loss for the Lightning, but it is just one loss. They’ll have a chance to get back on the winning streak against Carolina on Saturday.
The Lines:
The Goals:
Anthony Cirelli (Brandon Hagel, Mikhail Sergachev) Power Play, 1-0 Lightning
Connor Bedard (Philipp Kurashev) 1-1
Nikita Kucherov (Tanner Jeannot, Victor Hedman) 2-1 Lightning
Kevin Korchinkski (Ryan Donato, MacKenzie Entwistle) 2-2
Tyler Johnson (Connor Bedard, Nick Foligno) 3-2 Blackhawks
Connor Bedard (Nick Foligno, Philipp Kurashev ) 4-2
Corey Perry (Connor Bedard, Nick Foligno) Power Play, 5-2 Blackhawks
Steven Stamkos (Anthony Cirelli, Brayden Point) 6-on-5 goal, 5-3 Blackhawks
