The Tampa Bay Lightning’s wild ride – a look back at their November

One of the many things we praised the Tampa Bay Lightning for in the month of October was their stability, both in their 5v5 play on the ice, and in the line-ups they rolled out on a nightly basis. Well, thanks to the injury gods, and a stunning swing of ups-and-downs throughout the month, that stability was blown to Mars as they stumbled to a 5-6-2 record.

Injuries to Brayden Point, Nick Paul, and Mitchell Chaffee wreaked havoc on their lines for several games. In a month where the offense was mixed-and-matched for many of the games, it seemed only fitting that their best offensive player, Nikita Kucherov, would also miss the last game of the month. Couple that with some regression in their 5v5 play and it’s easy to see why their strong start hit a bit of a road block.

It really was a roller-coaster month for the Lightning that saw them start November with four straight losses, then rally with three straight wins, and finish the month alternating between wins and losses. There were really, really good games (wins against Winnipeg, Colorado, and New Jersey) along with really bad games (losses to Winnipeg, Washington, and Columbus) as well as confusing games (shoot-out loss to Philly and an overtime win against Nashville). Say what you will, pretty much every night in November was a surprise for Lightning fans as they didn’t know what team would show up on the ice.

Taken as a whole, things weren’t really that bad. Yes, the 5v5 scoring dipped, but they made some of that back with an improved power play. Overall, they allowed too many goals, but there was a marked improvement in defending the high-danger areas, and they cut down on the scoring chances against.

A quick scan of the table above would lead someone to point their finger at the goaltending and decide that was the immediate cause of the Lightning’s sub-.500 record. And it is true to a point. Andrei Vasilevskiy was not as good in November as he was in October. At 5v5 he posted a .907 SV%, which ranked 15th out of 24th among goaltenders in the league that played at least 400 minutes last month.

What’s interesting about his numbers, especially when coupled with Jonas Johansson’s, is that they aren’t surrendering goals from the most dangerous areas. As a tandem they’ve stopped 64 of 74 high-danger shots against, for an .865% SV%. JoJo has been particularly solid, stopping 25 of 27 in November from the dangerous spots, a drastic improvement from the 9-for-13 mark he posted in October. Where the Lightning netminders have been susceptible, especially of late, is from the mid-danger spot, where they’ve allowed 14 goals on 79 shots.

The visualization above does encompass the entire season, but it illustrates the problem the Lightning have had recently. Teams are getting quality chances from less dangerous areas as Tampa Bay focuses, maybe a little too much, on protecting the crease.

Honestly, if we look at a game-by-game basis, the best barometer for how the Lightning played last month, was the medium-danger shots. During their strongest run of play, from the Philly shoot-out loss to the overtime win against Pittsburgh, Vasilevskiy stopped all 20 medium-danger shots he faced at 5v5. Over the final four games of the month he allowed 6 goals on 26 shots from that distance and the Lightning went 1-3 in those games. As for Johansson, he allowed 4 goals on 8 medium-danger shots in the loss to Columbus while stopping 3-of-4 in the win against Nashville.

Some of these chances are coming off of turnovers in their own zone. Others are coming from the forwards sinking a bit too deep into the zone and allowing the defense to step up and release their shots from a better spot than along the blue line, as was the case in Minnesota on Brock Faber’s goal.

That goal was a bit of a combination of the two issues. First Conor Geekie wasn’t able to clear the puck, and so he is caught down low and is late getting back to the middle of the ice, which allows Faber to coast closer to the net for a better shot. As he tries to get out to defend it, Geekie cuts across Vasilevskiy’s line of sight as the shot is released.

The Lightning have been at their best this season when they’ve been pressuring at the blue lines, either in denying entries, or forcing the defenseman to dump the puck wide of the net when they’re already set up in the zone. At times in November, they lost that structure and it cost them.

Second periods really haunted them last month as they were outscored 17-10 in the middle frames, which is a shame since they started so many games off strongly (18-8 first period goal differential). The Lightning led after the first period in eight of their thirteen games last month, but only won three of them. In fact, they were better off if they were behind on the scoreboard after the first 20 minutes, as they went 2-1 in those games. For a team that prided themselves on playing well with the lead for the longest time, it’s disheartening to see them stumble in the middle frames and undo all of the positive work they put forth in the early stages of the game.

If we look to the bright side, they are getting better at spreading out their scoring. With the injuries, there were a few too many nights where they went 11/7 to properly compare the lines from month-to-month, but one thing that stood out is, that no matter who they played with, Anthony Cirelli and Brandon Hagel were putting the puck in the net. In November, the duo were together for 13 Lightning goals while posting a 64.97% share in expected goals and an outstanding 71.43% share of high-danger chances.

It is interesting to note that 8 of those goals came with Kucherov as the third member of the line. Could we see that trio reunited when the Lightning take to the ice on Thursday? Most of their playing time came when Point was out of the line-up, but they did reunite sporadically throughout the month when Coach Cooper wanted to shake things up.

The special teams numbers in October were not great (14.7% power play, 72.2% penalty kill). We are happy to say, the death of the Lightning power play was greatly exaggerated, and it looks like Kucherov and company are up to their old shenanigans with the extra skater. In November, they converted 32.4% of their power play opportunities, which ranked third in the league. Meanwhile, they weren’t getting burned down a skater quite as often as they finished the month with an 84.4% success rate short-handed.

With the talent they have on the team, it was only a matter of time until they figured out the power play. Brayden Point, Victor Hedman, and Nikita Kucherov will only be held down for so long on the score sheet when they have time and space. A couple of things have aided in their boost in production. For one, their entries have been a lot cleaner, and they’ve been able to spend more time in the zone.

Secondly, and most importantly, they haven’t been tied to one structure. They’ve moved their key personnel around with Kucherov posting up both on his traditional right side and the left side, and they’ve moved Jake Guentzel or Brandon Hagel to the bumper position with Brayden Point playing a little further away from the net. He responded with a league-leading 6 power-play goals in November (old friend Steven Stamkos was second with 5).

As we see in the video above, Hedman and Kucherov are in their usual spots, but Brandon Hagel is in Point’s normal spot in the slot while Jake Guentzel is being a menace right in front of the goaltender. Point is off to the left circle and free to get his shot off after Kucherov’s needle-threading pass.

It took the players and the coaching staff a little while to figure out how to make things work without the threat of the big Stamkosian shot from the left circle, and while Point doesn’t have that skill with one-timer, he has a quick release with his wrist show, and chemistry to know when to expect Kucherov’s passes, and the ability to make solid contact with them when they are scalded over to him.

Meanwhile, Hagel is still a threat in the slot for the quick bump shots, and Guentzel is uniquely suited to disappearing in front of the net for deflections and rebounds. This current line-up is likely what we will see moving forward, and will be able to mix things up enough to keep opponents guessing. If it does get stagnant, they can move Point back to the slot, flip Kucherov to the left side, and start looking for Guentzel on the back door for tap-ins.

Shorthanded, they’re just playing better. (That’s what you’re here for, the expert analysis). They’ve cut down their shots against, scoring chances against, and high-danger chances against. By shaving off six high-danger chances against per 60 minutes (29.52 in October vs. 23.51 in November) they are making the workload for their goaltenders easier, and that is reflected in a boost in save percentage (.796 in October vs. .875 in November).

It’s also helped that they haven’t spent as much time in the penalty box. In October they averaged 3.6 penalties per game, a number they trimmed to 2.46 in November. Not only does that put less stress on the defense, it keeps their best players on the ice more often, and helps prevent a disruption to the rhythm of their 5v5 play.

To sum things up, it wasn’t a great month for the Lightning, but it wasn’t a terrible one. There were points left on the table, but they did improve some of their underlying numbers. It looked like things were getting on track and then some injuries uncovered their lack of depth. While they will start December out of a playoff spot, they will have a number of games in hand on the teams they are chasing with some winnable games on the schedule coming up.

Some quick thoughts about November:

• Best overall win – 4-0 win over the Devils
• Worst overall loss – 7-6 (OT) to Columbus
• MVP – Brandon Hagel – 17 points (4 goals, 13 assists) 4.36 iXG in 13 games
• Brayden Point is gunning for the Hockey Cy Young award as he posted 10 goals with 0 assists in the month.
• Of the 21 players that suited up for a game in November, 20 recorded a point. Only Conor Sheary was held off of the score sheet. To be fair, he only played in one game. Of the 20 that had a point, 19 had at least two, with Gage Goncalves the lone single-point player in the month. In October, only 17 of the 20 players had points, with just 14 recording at least two.
• The fourth line of Zemgus Girgensons, Luke Glendening, and Mikey Eyssimont finally got on the scoreboard with goals in two of the last four games of the month. On the year they have been on the ice for two goals scored and two goals allowed while posting a 1.84 expected goals against. It’s not exciting hockey when they’re out there, but they’re doing their job.