With the Montreal Canadiens losing (in regulation) their final game of the regular season, the Tampa Bay Lightning have secured home ice in their first-round match-up that starts this weekend. Is that a good thing? After all, this is a team that is 1-7 at home during their last three playoff series. In case you were wondering, yes, they lost all three of those series.
What’s been even more frustrating is that the Lightning had been very, very good at home during the regular season. Over those three seasons, Tampa Bay posted 82 wins in 123 games at Amalie Arena. Only Carolina (86) and Winnipeg (83) had more victories over those three years (Florida was tied for 8th with 76).
This season they’ve been good this year (26-13-1)* but not as dominating as they have been in the past. Ironically, it was their road play (24-12-5) that helped them to home ice this season. Only Colorado had more wins while staying in hotel rooms this season. (Montreal also had 24 wins away from Bell Centre.)
While recent history hasn’t been kind to them, what has home ice meant to them during the Jon Cooper Era? This is now the twelfth post season during Coach Cooper’s tenure. The team has won six opening round series** and lost five (our favorite Cooper playoff stat is that he’s never lost a second round series in the NHL – if they win the first round, they’re getting to at least the Conference Finals). Let’s take a look at how many of those the Lightning had home ice for:
2014 – Home Ice – Lost Game One and Two on their way to getting swept by the Canadiens.
2015 – Home Ice – Lost Game one, won Game Two against the Red Wings. Won the series in seven.
2016 – Home Ice – Won Game One and Two against the Red Wings and won the series in five.
2018 -Home Ice – Won Game One and Two against the Devils and won the series in five.
2019 – Home Ice – Lost Game One and Two before getting swept by the Blue Jackets
2020 – Home Ice – Split the first two games against Columbus. They won the series in five.
2021 – Road Team – Won Game One and Two in Florida, lost Game Three at home before winning the series in six.
2022 -Road Team – Split Game One and Two in Toronto, Split Three and Four in Tampa before winning in seven.
2023 – Road Team – Split Game One and Two in Toronto. Lost Games Three, Four, and Six in overtime on home ice as they lost the series in six.
2024 – Road Team – Lost Game One and Two in Florida. Won Game Four on home ice before losing the series in five.
2025 – Home Ice – Lost Game One, Two, and Five on home ice while losing the series in five.
Okay, so they had home ice seven times and have gone 3-4 4-3 in those series. Well, that’s not great. It’s perfectly fine. Does past performance indicate future success or failure? Honestly, no. Is it nice that the Lightning have home ice? Yes, especially if this series goes seven games, which it very well could. If you’re the Lightning would you rather have Game 7 at home or in the Bell Centre? We think the answer is pretty clear on that.
The Lightning are a deeper team than they have been over the last three seasons, and that could be the difference in what should be a very close series. Having the last line change in four of the seven games could be just enough of an advantage to allow the Lightning to advance to the second round.
*Note – The Lightning are 27-13-1 in the city of Tampa, but the Stadium Series game is considered a “neutral site” venue for the purposes of home/away stats. Cool.
** So, yeah one of those was in the bubble for the 2020 playoffs. Did they get to feed off of a home crowd? No, but they did get the rules advantages of the home team (match-ups, etc.) so we’re counting it!
