You’re welcome, Ottawa.
The Tampa Bay Lightning finally did it. For the first time since March 13th, 2012, the Bolts walked off the ice with a victory over the Boston Bruins. The ten-game losing streak is over. Today is a day that will go down in history.
While the Bruins heavily outshot the Bolts, the margin that matters and favors Tampa Bay is the 5-3 score. Further, the shot clock didn’t really tell much of a story, as Tampa was generally the better team all night long. Boston just had no answer for the speed of the Lightning skaters. The following score-adjusted Fenwick chart, courtesy of HockeyStats.ca, helps to illustrate what that speed did for Tampa on this occasion:
This was a victory Tampa Bay earned and deserved.
Despite all that, the Lightning’s path to victory was far from smooth. That’s evidenced best by the fact that Patrice Bergeron opened the scoring just 33 seconds into the game. That made it 1-0 Bruins, and sent an ‘Oh no, here we go again…’ vibe through the rafters at Amalie Arena.
But, rather than roll over, the Bolts fought right back. Vladislav Namestnikov scored at 5:49 to tie the game at one, which really got the Lightning rolling. Assisted by Brenden Morrow and J.T. Brown on that goal, Namestnikov continues to impress. It’s hard to imagine that the team will send him down to Syracuse even when Cedric Paquette is healthy – he’s been that good.
Tampa’s real spark came about four minutes after Namestnikov scored, and it came in the form of a Steven Stamkos fight. After Brad Marchand nailed Valtteri Filppula with a very late hit, it was the captain who stepped up in place of the absent officials. He stormed Marchand and threw the diminutive forward to the ice with ease:
It takes a lot to get number-91 to drop the gloves. His teammates took note.
Boosted by that Stamkos tussle, the Bolts scored two goals in quick succession. J.T. Brown got it started with his first goal in forever, and Anton Stralman followed up only 15 seconds later to extend the Lightning lead to 3-1. Good work, Brad. Well done.
The Lightning carried that momentum into the second period, though Boston stepped up and made things more difficult. Even so, the Lightning refused to break down. The only goal scored in the middle frame was Jason Garrison’s fourth of the season, an absolute bomb from the point. That made it 4-1, and created quite a change in the atmosphere at Amalie Arena – numerous Boston fans mysteriously disappeared:
It was a decidedly pro-Lightning crowd for the rest of the game.
With victory square in their sights, it seemed as though the Bolts lost focus in the third period. Boston controlled the bulk of the play, and generated numerous scoring opportunities. Ben Bishop made the saves he needed to make, and helped his team maintain their lead as a result. Zdeno Chara and Daniel Paille scored goals in the latter half of the period to make the game close, but Ondrej Palat sandwiched a goal of his own in between to ensure that his team was never in real danger. The result was a 5-3 victory for Tampa against the Boston Bruins – there’s something I haven’t typed in a long, long time.
I don’t know whether fans in Tampa wanted the Lightning to win tonight more than fans in Ottawa wanted the Lightning to win, but what I do know is that Boston is now in serious trouble. The Bruins sit only one point up on the Senators for the second wildcard spot in the East, and the Senators hold two games in hand on them. This game could be a killer for Boston. The ball is really in Ottawa's court now.
For the Lightning, it’s another two points in the standings and another step closer to home-ice advantage in the playoffs. All in all, this was a nice way to cap off a big weekend.
As always, thanks for reading.
Michael Stuart has been the Tampa Bay Lightning writer for HockeyBuzz since 2012. Visit his archive to read more or follow him on Twitter. 
Ottawa Senators Blogger • 
Join the Discussion:
»