The Tampa Bay Lightning’s final shot of the night was wristed just wide of the net by a frustrated Brandon Hagel. Seeing how it came a full second or two after the horn had sounded, the Columbus Blue Jackets took exception and buried Hagel under a sea of blue jerseys.When the teams were finally separated, Columbus went to celebrate, and the Lightning were left with another frustrating loss as Kirill Marchenko’s early third period goal proved to be the difference in the 3-2 Blue Jackets victory.
It was a back-and-forth game, at least on the scoreboard. Columbus opened the scoring as Erik Cernak struggled to get his stick on a puck in front of the net, which allowed Kent Johnson to collect it and put it past Jonas Johansson, who was making his second start of the night.
Kent Johnson (Boone Jenner, Adam Fantilli) 1-0
It was another slow start for the Lightning as they were a step behind the play for most of the period. Their offense was disconnected which made it hard to get the puck into the zone for any sustained amount of time. Sometimes, when stringing passes together is a problem, just getting the puck on net is the best play. Ryan McDonagh, come on down. He entered the zone and his shot ticked off of a stick just enough to befuddle Jet Greaves.
Ryan McDonagh (Pontus Holmberg, Erik Cernak) 1-1
Four minutes later, the Lightning struck on the power play. Yup, they managed to score a power play goal without Nikita Kucherov. Jake Guentzel was the catalyst as he fired a shot-pass from the right circle that hit Greaves’ pads and deflected right to Anthony Cirelli, who had established position in the slot. Cirelli backhanded the rebound home to give the Bolts a lead.
Anthony Cirelli (Jake Guentzel, Victor Hedman) Power Play, 2-1 Lightning
It wasn’t the prettiest first period in the Lightning’s history, but they found a way to put the puck in the net a couple of times. They finished stronger than they started, and there was a sense they could carry that into the second period and take advantage of a Columbus team that has struggled to start the season. Unfortunately, the Blue Jackets didn’t get the memo, and they skated the Lightning off of the ice in the middle frame.
Let’s sum it up with a social media post.
Let's check some @naturalstattrick.com numbers through two (all situations) Shot attempts – 51-27 (Columbus) Scoring Chances – 21-8 (Columbus) High-danger – 11-5 (Columbus) Columbus xGF% – 65.24% The fact that the Lightning even have a chance to win this game is amazing.
— Raw Charge (@rawcharge.com) October 18, 2025 at 9:10 PM
Columbus started at the puck drop and continued until the horn sounded. The eagle-eyed video crew protected the one-goal lead for a bit as the Blue Jackets had a goal waved off after the play was determined to be off-side. The writing was on the wall, though, and Damon Severson tied it up fourteen minutes into the period.
Damon Severson (Mathieu Olivier, Charlie Coyle) 2-2
After the game, studio analyst Pat Maroon spoke about how struggling teams find things going against them, even the bounces. This goal is an example. It’s not a great breakout pass by Columbus, but Mathieu Olivier sticks his skate out behind him and the puck hit it and dropped right to his teammate. Cirelli’s back-check on the entry disrupted what Columbus wanted to do, but Ryan McDonagh toe-picked and wasn’t in position to block the centering feed. The broken play caught Erik Cernak in no-man’s land and he isn’t able to step up on Severson who had space to wrist it past Johansson.
Of course, it’s not all bad luck. The Lighting weren’t able to win the board battle in the offensive zone, which allowed the initial breakout pass, and Gage Goncalves didn’t read the threat from Severson, and was late on his back-check. The result – a tie game.
Still, the Lightning had a tied game heading into the third period. If they could push like they did against Detroit, they could snag a couple of points to close out the road trip. Instead, it was Columbus that grabbed the lead off of the drop of the puck.
Just over a minute into the period, Columbus caught the Lightning chasing in transition. Marchenko received the puck with a head of steam, and Goncalves, wary of taking a penalty, failed to tie him up. The big forward beat Johansson to give the Blue Jackets the lead they wouldn’t surrender.
Kirill Marchenko (Dmitri Voronkov, Zach Werenski) 3-2 Blue Jackets
A later flurry of desperation led to some scoring chances for the Bolts, and helped even things up on the stat sheet a bit, but it wasn’t enough as Greaves made some outstanding stops with chaos in front of him to hold onto the slim lead.
The regulation loss dropped the Lightning to 1-3-2 on the season, and their four points have them tied for last in the Atlantic with Ottawa and Buffalo. They are off until Thursday when Chicago comes into town. The season may still be young, but it’s also getting late fast, and they need to use this time to figure things out.
