Seconds before the first TV timeout in the second period, defenseman Victor Hedman stepped up on Calgary Flames forward Garnet Hathaway to halt an offensive zone entry. The confrontation left Hedman limping, and he exited the game with a lower-body injury and did not return. The Lightning lost to the Flames 5-1, but the big-picture consequences of the injury to arguably the franchise’s most valuable skater were the most significant outcome from last night.
With one more game before their bye week, the Lightning had enjoyed a charmed season from an injury standpoint. The Hedman injury demonstrates the fragility of success in the NHL. In Hedman’s absence, a Lightning defensive group that has offensive capability, but also some flaws, unspooled.
On the deciding goal that pushed the Flames to a 2-1 lead, Calgary forward Johnny Gaudreau slipped behind a wobbly Braydon Coburn and buried an unimpeded scoring chance. Coburn does not have the foot speed to stay in front of Gaudreau. The NHL’s most dynamic forwards bullying the Lightning’s defensemen, who are uneven outside of the Anton Stralman-Mikhail Sergachev pairing, became a chilling possibility. Even before Hedman’s injury, Calgary’s speed had caused headaches for Tampa Bay’s defense on retrievals and zone exits. Jake Dotchin’s turnover in the neutral zone less than a minute into the game had the cascading effect of Gaudreau’s white-hot line pouncing on the puck-management miscue, with Michael Ferland burying the opportunity.
As of this writing, Hedman’s long-term health status is unknown, but the Mark Jankowski goal provides the most interesting sequence to analyze from a macro-strategy standpoint. The Flames dumped the puck in, and when goaltender Andrei Vasilevskiy guided the puck to Stralman along the goal line, Stralman’s defensive partner Andrej Sustr saw that Calgary’s two forecheckers were deep but positioned ineffectively and jumped on the sloppy separation between the F2 and F3.
Stralman connected with Sustr on a diagonal pass that allowed Sustr to lead the transition opportunity. As Sustr crossed the blue line to enter the offensive zone, Tampa Bay had the numbers advantage with Sustr and three Tampa Bay forwards attacking three Flames in their own-zone coverage. But that is where things got sticky. Sustr, not the most graceful skater or a natural creator, was pushed to the outside boards, fired a shot off Flames goaltender Mike Smith’s far pad, and the puck swung around the boards. Now it was the Flames turn for a rush chance. Flames forward Hathaway collected the puck, carried it through the neutral zone, and passed it to Jankowski, who pulled a slick deke on a Lightning skater to get a shot attempt in the low slot. The Lightning skater who was beaten to the inside was forward Yanni Gourde.
When Hedman is healthy, playmaking from the Lightning defensemen has a stimulating effect on the offense. On the rush, it allows Tampa Bay’s talented forwards to determine the pace they want to enter the zone and where they want to situate themselves for the best scoring look. On the cycle, it forces movement and accountability from the defensive coverage; the cycle tends to proceed slower than the rush, but a missed assignment can result in a backdoor scoring chance. And similar to the rush, that off-the-puck freedom gives the forwards the ability to exploit the high-low interchange.
For half of the sequence that led to Jankowski’s goal, Sustr’s instincts were excellent. The Lightning might want to recalibrate their philosophy with their defensemen if the Hedman injury is long-term, but with or without Hedman, when there is a gap that big, Tampa Bay wants that exploited.
Hedman has the best playmaking ability of any Lightning defenseman, and if he is out of the lineup it is worth pondering whether a Sustr-led four-on-three versus Stralman and Gourde defending a three-on-two is a worthy tradeoff in order to stick to coach Cooper’s philosophy of an engaged defensive group. In 2018, a degree of mobility from defensemen is a requisite. One of the reasons for the Lightning’s success has been the contribution of scoring from their defense. This cannot go out the window if Hedman is out. Sergachev’s impact is blunted if he is not slithering through defenders. Stralman excels at dashing to the backdoor for scoring chances. Like Sergachev, he can carry the puck and open up passing and shooting lanes for forwards, but also has the recovery ability to not leave Tampa Bay naked and vulnerable.
One of the Lightning’s strengths is their versatility. They can win games 5-4 or 1-0. For the Lightning, maybe a more moderate approach for a hobbled defense calls for the Sustrs and Coburns to be used as instruments for establishing territorial advantage, but not as facilitators. This might lead to more 1-0’s, but adaption to changing personnel is necessary. Shooting far side was clearly a brain lapse by Sustr, but, once he got cordoned off, it might have made more sense to shovel it into the corner and let a capable third line work the forecheck. Without Hedman, the Lightning do not need to become stodgy; they just need to play smarter.