With a flair for the dramatic, and the controversial, and behind a 5-4 finish at the Barclays Center, The Tampa Bay Lightning are now just two wins away from a return to the Eastern Conference Finals.
In the first second-round home playoff game for the Isles since 1993, the Lightning weathered surge after surge from the Blue and Orange, found the game-tying goal with under 40 seconds to go from Nikita Kucherov, and ultimately sealed the deal in overtime behind Brian Boyle’s goal.
But, again, it was far from that simple.
The Isles’ night began with Josh Bailey’s first goal in 22 games, and his first of the 2016 Playoffs, after No. 12 had been out of action for the first two games of the series. Tampa Bay managed to escape the period -- and that’s the right way to put it -- with just one goal against in spite of 17 Islander shots on Lightning netminder Ben Bishop, and even managed to knot things up before the period finished behind a Ryan Callahan power-play goal at 19:47.
The Bolts jumped out front midway through the second period off a Victor Hedman’s blast, but this time, it would be the Islanders that came back with a response with a bomb of their own, this one off the stick of defenseman Nick Leddy for his first goal of the postseason.
Bailey scored his second of the night, a power-play goal, at 2:27 of the third period, but Lightning forward Vladislav Namestnikov (skating in Jonathan Drouin’s spot on the second line following Drouin’s brief exit from the game) knotted things up just 58 seconds after Bailey’s marker.
And so continued the violent tug of war between these two clubs, until Cal Clutterbuck struck with the go-ahead goal with an absolute snipe through Bishop at 11:23 of the third. Of New York’s four goals on Bishop, this was the worst, and through no fault of Bishop’s, mind you. With the puck in the corner and three Tampa Bay skaters near it -- Boyle, Cedric Paquette, and Jason Garrison -- the Lightning were somehow all beat and allowed Casey Cizikas to get the puck to an all-alone Clutterbuck.
But as Cooper pulled Bishop late in the game (and quite early at least in terms of trying to tie a one-goal game), the Lightning cracked up the pressure on goaltender Thomas Greiss, and found the seam behind a great dish from the returned Drouin, to Kucherov, for his seventh of the series.
On to overtime for the first time in the series, it would be the Lightning that struck first, shortly after Boyle leveled Thomas Hickey at the New York blue line, and led the charge in for his second goal of the postseason, scored on a sprawled Greiss just 2:48 into the first overtime frame.
Bishop finished the night with 35 saves on 39 shots against, while four Lightning skaters finished the night with multi-point efforts (Callahan, Hedman, Valtteri Filppula, and Alex Killorn).
Random thoughts and notes
- OK, let’s begin with the obvious: Was the Boyle-on-Hickey hit dirty and/or a penalty?
To be honest, no.
If we’re to buy into the idea that a huge part of the playoffs is still finishing your check (something the Islanders still clearly believe in with the way they deploy that fourth line), then what Boyle did is no worse than what Casey Cizikas did to Erik Condra in Game 1, or what Hickey did to Drouin earlier in the game. In a regular season game, is it interference? Maybe. But in overtime of a playoff game, that’s not getting called. And while New York head coach Jack Capuano wanted to complain about it after the game (he called it ‘a hit we’re trying to get rid of’), it’s worth noting that just because it happened against your team and you don’t like it, doesn’t mean that it’s dirty. Can’t have it both ways.
- And on the Hickey on Drouin hit, my first reaction was, “Oh man, this is dirty.” But then I watched it again and again, and I felt it was more hockey than anything else. It’s so difficult to gauge where intent and malice is in this series when the temperatures run hot. Also: Everything looks awful in slo-mo.
- Victor Hedman has really emerged as the series MVP for the Bolts. In addition to the hard minutes he’s logged against New York’s best, Hedman’s offensive game has really taken flight. With a goal and two assists in Game 3, the towering Swede now has two goals and six points in three games this series.
Up next
A Friday night Game 4 at the Barclays Center. ‘Cause imagine if this series had any flow whatsoever?
Ty Anderson has been covering the National Hockey League for HockeyBuzz.com since 2010, has been a member of the Pro Hockey Writers Association's Boston Chapter since 2013, and can be contacted on Twitter, or emailed at Ty.AndersonHB[at]gmail.com.
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