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25 Greatest Scorers in Lightning History: #9

August 14, 2017, 7:49 AM ET [2 Comments]
John Gove
Calgary Flames Blogger • RSSArchiveCONTACT


In honor of the upcoming season, which is the franchise's 25th, I thought it would be fun to use this hockey downtime to countdown the 25 greatest goal scorers in Tampa Bay Lightning history.

In constructing this list, I not only took into account the number of goals a player scored while playing in Tampa, I also considered a number of games they suited up for the Lightning. As this list progresses over the next few weeks, you will notice that some players are ranked higher than others even if their goal total was less. This is because although someone scored slightly fewer goals, they reached those numbers in fewer games.

Due to the Lightning still being a relatively young franchise, a good deal of these players are still active, and some of them still take the ice for the Bolts.

Enjoy!


The List So Far
Number 25: Pavel Kubina
Number 24: Victor Hedman
Number 23: Mikael Andersson
Number 22: Roman Hamrlik
Number 21: Dan Boyle
Number 20: Rob Zamuner
Number 19: Valtteri Filppula
Number 18: Alex Killorn
Number 17: Chris Gratton
Number 16: Teddy Purcell
Number 15: Ruslan Fedotenko
Number 14: Ondrej Palat
Number 13: Dave Andreychuk
Number 12: Alex Selivanov
Number 11: Ryan Malone
Number 10: Tyler Johnson


Number 9: Petr Klima

Petr Klima had already established himself as quite the talented scorer before joining the Tampa Bay Lightning in 1993. He was selected in the fifth round (86th overall) by the Detroit Red Wings in the 1983 NHL Entry Draft and saw his first NHL action in the 1985-86 season. Before Klima could play for Detroit, he had to defect to North America from Czechoslovakia. He was able to successfully do so and became the first Czech player to defect directly to a team based in the United States. Before him, players would have to go the route of defecting to a Canadian team first and then make their way into the United States.

Klima displayed his gift for lighting the lamp right away, scoring 32 goals in his rookie season. When his time with Detroit was complete, he had managed to tally 130 goals in 306 games. During the 1989-90 regular season, Klima was traded to the Edmonton Oilers where he would win a Stanley Cup. He would score a career-high 40 goals with the Oilers the following season.

By the time Klima joined the Lightning, he already had 249 goals to his name. In his first season with the Bolts, he managed to record 28 goals in 75 games. He was never able to match that number in his next two seasons with Tampa Bay but was still able to do his fair share of contributing. In only 189 games over three seasons with the Lightning, Klima had recorded 63 goals. He did some damage on the power play, scoring 22 of his 63 goals with a least a one man advantage.

Yes, one could argue that Klima's name is far too high on this list. There certainly people who had scored more that are ranked lower. However, I want you to keep in mind how brief his stint was with the Lightning. That is why he climbed all the way up to number nine.
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