Having won their last two games against challenging opponents, the Ducks and Kings, conversations involving the Tampa Bay Lightning and a push for the playoffs have resurfaced.
The Lightning recorded their first blowout victory in quite sometime Tuesday night against Los Angeles creating a buzz in AMALIE ARENA that has been missing for most of the season. Although the excitement over the two consecutive wins is completely acceptable, it is a little premature to discuss the Bolts turning around their season and making the playoffs.
Consistency has been a struggle for Tampa Bay through their first 54 games of the 2016-17 regular season. The team has not experienced a winning streak longer than two games since mid-November when they won four in a row.
February has looked good so far but they have only played three games this month, winning two of them. January, on the other hand, was absolutely terrible as the Lightning managed to win only three out of 13 games. The month of December wasn't much better either.
The team has not shown any signs of being able to maintain a productive level of play on the ice since they lost Steven Stamkos in November. Just because they have looked good in their past two contests does not mean the Bolts are all of a sudden back in the playoff hunt. Let's at least wait to see how they do on the road this weekend against Minnesota and Winnipeg before we go there.
I am not trying to discourage you from feeling good about the Lightning's level of play recently. I just want to stress that you should show a little caution before getting all pumped that this team could possibly be postseason bound.
Have a question you would like answered in Sunday's "Lightning Mailbag"? Just send it to me at johngove21@gmail.com with the subject line "HockeyBuzz Lightning Mailbag".