For the second time in a week, Ilya Sorokin had the Tampa Bay Lightning’s number. After he stopped 27-of-28 shots in the Lightning’s 2-1 loss on December 3, he was even better on Saturday night, denying all 32 shots they threw at him in a 2-0 win. Calum Ritchie broke the scoreless tie in the third period and Casey Cizikas sealed the win with an empty-net goal. Jonas Johansson, making his second start in a row, stopped 17-of-18 shots.
Johansson started in place of Andrei Vasilevskiy, who missed his second game in a row. The Big Cat wasn’t the only star to miss the game as Nikita Kucherov was also on the sidelines. On a slightly brighter note, Victor Hedman did return to action, playing 16:43 in his return after missing 12 games with an undisclosed injury. Jack Finely, who has been scratched for seven of the last eight games, drew back into the line-up as well.
Much like the first meeting between the two teams, the Lightning carried the pace of play, especially in the first period when the majority of action was in the Islanders zone. Despite outshooting the Islanders 9-4, the Bolts couldn’t solve Sorokin, although they came close a few times with Dominic James putting a shot off his mask and Max Crozier ringing one off of the post.
The Lightning continued their commitment to getting in front of the net, literally. Just minutes into the middle frame Emil Lilleberg drove the net and got a shot off before getting buried by Scott Mayfield and the duo crashed into Sorokin, halting play. The two teams traded fruitless power plays midway through the period with the biggest thing to note that Hedman wasn’t on either unit as Charle-Edouard D’Astous and Darren Raddysh were the triggermen on the units that the Lightning rolled out.
After Anders Lee and Anthony Duclair pinged a couple of pucks off of the post the Lightning had their second (and last) power play opportunity of the night. Anthony Cirelli had the best chance right in front of the net, but Sorokin was there to make the save. There was a lot of zone time for the Bolts, but no finish.
Things tightened up in the third period as neither team was able to generate any chances that were considered dangerous at 5v5. Unfortunately for the Lightning Brandon Hagel was involved in another bizarre play that went against him.
In front of the Islanders bench, Hagel was tied up with Kyle MacLean when a stick clipped Cizikas in the face. Play continued for awhile before it was eventually blown dead. After a huddle the officials sent Hagel to the box for a four-minute high-stick. A call that had Coach Cooper slamming the door shut in front of the officials, and biting his tongue after the game,
“You know what, if I start talking about that, I’m going to…look. It’s just tough for me because MacLean had his stick. So now, there’s no doubt it’s Hagel’s stick that clipped Cizikas…I just thought this was a game that the players should have decided, and there could have been opportunities for that, but it didn’t.”
After a call like that, it was almost predetermined that something bad would happen. Sure enough on the back-end of the long penalty kill, Calum Ritchie made what can only be described as a really, really nifty play.
Calum Ritchie [3] (Anders Lee, Tony DeAngelo) Power Play, 1-0 Islanders
Power play goal for New York! Scored by Calum Ritchie with 07:14 remaining in the 3rd period. Assisted by Anders Lee and Tony DeAngelo. Tampa Bay: 0 New York: 1 #NYIvsTBL #GoBolts #Isles
— NHL Goals (@nhlgoals.bsky.social) December 6, 2025 at 9:25 PM
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That is a tough angle to slip a puck past a goaltender, and going between his legs to do it make it even sweeter. The Lightning pushed with Johansson on the bench, but couldn’t find the equalizer. Cizikas made it all academic by finding the empty net with two seconds left.
The Lightning probably don’t deserve to be on a three-game losing streak based on the way they’ve been playing. Outside of a careless turnover against Pittsburgh, they’ve been really solid in their own zone, and they’ve generated enough chances to have scored more than four goals in their last three. They are doing the right things and just have to play through it right now.
Process over outcome has to be the mantra and the worst thing they can do is change the way they play and start cheating for offense. Keep building in the their own zone, keep generating chances, and the goals will come.
Because it was a day that ended in “y” the Lightning couldn’t avoid the injury bug. This time it was Dominic James (maybe an upper-body injury suffered in the third) and Curtis Douglas (checked hard along the boards in the third period) that failed to finish the night on the ice. Coach Cooper did not have an update on their status after the game but conceded that, “we might have a different line-up against Toronto”.
Highlights
Pretty Colors!
#NHL GameScore Impact Card for Tampa Bay Lightning on 2025-12-06 #GoBolts
— HockeyStatCards (@hockeystatcards.com) December 6, 2025 at 10:33 PM
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