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Bolts back home against Ovechkin's Capitals

December 3, 2016, 4:00 PM ET [2 Comments]
Ty Anderson
Tampa Bay Lightning Blogger • RSSArchiveCONTACT
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Boy, are the Tampa Bay Lightning happy to see you, Amalie Arena.

After three straight games away from home, eight of their last 10 overall away from their home rink and a league-high 15 road games to their name this season, the Lightning are back home and looking to snap their season-high four-game losing streak with a visit from the Washington Capitals.

And in a battle of struggling teams (the Caps come into tonight’s tilt with losses in two straight and five of their last 10 overall, the Bolts know they have to ready from puckdrop.

"It's just about being ready to play," Lightning netminder Ben Bishop said ahead of tonight’s game. "Obviously, the last game, had a couple power plays, but, it's just about being ready to go from the start. We can talk about it all we want, but it's about going out there and doing it.”

Washington ace Braden Holtby gets the start for the Caps for the third straight game.

Holtby took a loss behind a 25-of-28 performance in his last start, and has allowed seven goals on his last 65 shots against (.892 save percentage). In his first start of the year against the Bolts, the 27-year-old comes into this game with seven wins and a .908 save percentage in 12 career head-to-heads.

The Lightning counter with Bishop.

Saddled with a loss in a 9-of-10 relief performance Thursday night against his hometown St. Louis Blues, the 6-foot-7 Bishop has now dropped four straight games, with 13 goals allowed over that stretch, including at least three goals allowed in the games he’s started over that span. To make matters worse, of course, Bishop enters play with just one win and an .880 save percentage in nine career games against the Capitals.

The Bolts are 6-3-1 at home this season.

Stats of Note


- Nikita Kucherov has three goals and six points in nine career games against the Caps.

- Victor Hedman has two goals and four points in his last five games.

- John Carlson has just two points in his last nine games.

- Washington captain Alex Ovechkin has 40 goals and 81 points in 60 games against the Bolts. Among active players, only Jaromir Jagr (82) has more points against the Lightning than Ovechkin.

- The Caps have the fifth-worst road power-play this year, with just two goals on 22 opportunities.

Other news and notes

Both Ryan Callahan and Jason Garrison are out of tonight’s game with lower-body injuries. This will be the third straight game Callahan has missed, while Garrison is out after taking a puck to the knee in Thursday’s loss to the Blues. The Lightning believe he should be OK sooner rather than later.

Welcome back to town, Brett Connolly.

The former sixth overall pick drafted by the Lightning in 2010, Connolly once again returns to Amalie Arena for a head-to-head with the Bolts, but this time in a Washington sweater versus the B’s sweater he donned against the Lightning for five prior showdowns. Connolly’s lone point against the Bolts? A game-winning goal, of course. On a fourth line with Jay Beagle and Tom Wilson, Connolly has tallied two goals and three points in 14 games this year.

The 24-year-old scored 18 goals and 32 points in 134 games with the Bolts from 2011 to 2015.

This will be the first of three meetings between the Bolts and Caps this season. Washington swept the season series a year ago, and outscored the Lightning 11-to-6 in those three games.

Ty Anderson has been covering the National Hockey League for HockeyBuzz.com since 2010 and has been a member of the Pro Hockey Writers Association's Boston Chapter since 2013. Ty is also the Boston Bruins beat writer for WEEI.com and can also be found in the New England Hockey Journal. Contact him on Twitter or send him an email at Ty.AndersonHB[at]gmail.com.
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