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It’s incredible to think of all the chances the Tampa Bay Lightning blew en route to their third-straight defeat, this time a 2-1 final against the Colorado Avalanche, at Amalie Arena on Thursday night.
At home for the first time since Oct. 17, the Bolts looked anything but comfortable on a night that began with a late-scratch to top-line winger Jonathan Drouin (lower-body). Or perhaps prepared is the better word there. Less than a minute into the game, the Lightning made life on goaltender Ben Bishop harder than it had to be, with Big Ben forced to stop a three-on-one bid from Matt Duchene and a solid shot from top-line center Nathan MacKinnon.
But as Bishop stood tall, the Lightning had a chance to reward their netminder with a goal -- something that had eluded the Bolts in the last 120 minutes plus -- by way of a power-play opportunity following a too-many-men bench minor against head coach Patrick Roy’s Avalanche squad 2:11 in.
So, let’s talk about this power play from the 26-second marker and onward point.
There, the Lightning were, with Carl Soderberg, an inexperienced penalty-killing center if there ever was one, out there for the Avalanche and the puck in the attacking zone. The Bolts kept Soderberg on the ice in his defensive zone -- although Soderberg had a couple rushes up ice that were quickly thwarted by a turnover -- for the next 1:34 of play. In total, Soderberg turned the puck over or lost a puck battle on three separate occasions. And Tampa Bay’s best chance in that 94-second came on a Ryan Callahan wrister that rang iron. The Lightning power play couldn’t handle the puck against significantly weaker forward competition in both experience and skill, and it was ugly. Just ugly.
Put back on the power play almost immediately following their unsuccessful first crack, the Bolts once again to put traffic, pucks, or anything for that matter, through Semyon Varlamov.
Tampa Bay came up with a big penalty-kill of their own later in the period, but it would be the Avs that scored first behind former Bolt Alex Tanguay’s first goal of the season.
The goal, put under Bishop’s pads and ultimately ruled a goal after a lengthy review, came with less than five minutes to go, and held as the game’s only goal through 20 minutes of play.
Colorado extended their lead to two late in the second period, too, with MacKinnon beating a backchecking J.T Brown for his fourth goal of the season. It was a goal that came on a second, nay, third-chance opportunity for the high-flying Avalanche, and went to show more of the ‘anything that can go wrong, will go wrong’ mentality of the Lightning throughout this three-game losing skid.
On their third power-play opportunity of the night, Alex Killorn and the Bolts responded by way of Killorn’s chip-in marker just 2:42 after MacKinnon’s strike, and brought Tampa Bay within one.
But it didn’t matter.
Center Tyler Johnson, snakebitten in search of his first goal of the season, couldn’t bury a puck through Varlamov before Soderberg shoved him into the net. The Lightning couldn’t capitalize when Duchene lifted the puck over the glass in his own zone and put the Bolts back to the man advantage late in the game. Victor Hedman couldn’t get his shot through in the final minute, nor could Steven Stamkos on an all-alone rush in on Varlamov with 33 seconds left to go.
And like that, the struggles of the Lightning, with losses in six of their last eight games, rolled on.
Random thoughts and notes
- OK, so every good team goes through these struggles. The season is an 82-game grind, and it’s simply bound to happen. But the Lightning looked rough on Thursday night. It’s one thing to get beat by good goaltending -- which I honestly think was the case in Tampa’s shutouts in both Chicago and St. Louis -- but to look this straight-up lost in a home game against a Colorado team that’s failed to get their footing at all in 2015-16 is tough. It’s doubly worse when you factor in how well this team has played at home.
At the same time, who needed this game more-- the Avalanche or the Lightning?
No matter the slump the Bolts are going through, I’d lean towards the Avs there. Head coach Patrick Roy has really tried just about everything in search of a 60-minute spark from his group, and while tonight was far from pretty, it got the job done. Varlamov stepped up when he had to (Varlamov did not wither on that late-game surge from the Bolts), and the Avalanche needed that from him.
In essence, I think you saw a bit more desperation from the Avalanche than you did the Lightning. And while that’s somewhat expected, you have to wonder how many more losses it takes before the Lightning become that team that needs to secure two points by any means necessary?
- One thing that stuck out to me in this one was the play of Tampa’s defense, and not in a good way.
We’re usually lauding the play of the Tampa point for their ability to accurately read the play and make simply phenomenal decisions with the puck and in regards to when it’s OK to join the rush. Tonight they approached the opposing blue-line with the confidence of a 14-year-old on their first day of high school. They were hesitant, late to pucks, and their sticks seemed consistently out of reach of the puck.
This is a spot where the Bolts need massive improvement from guys like Hedman, Garrison, and Stralman -- at least in terms of their ability to keep plays alive -- to snap out of this minor funk and get their offensive game charged up to where it’s been for the last season plus.
- It’s tough to put a positive spin on any injury to Jonathan Drouin. With a goal and six points in 10 games, I think that Drouin has really come into his own as a second-year NHLer this season on the left wing of the Lightning first line with Callahan and Stamkos. (Hell, who wouldn’t?) But if there’s one positive in this loss, it was the seamless transition back with No. 24 and 91 from Alex Killorn.
Killorn obviously has experience playing with these guys dating back to last season, but Killorn brought an added element of size and battle along the boards that gave the Avs some troubles, especially with Callahan doing the same on the opposite wall. That opens up a lot of ice for Stamkos. (That’s good.)
Up next
The Bolts continue their homestand with a Sat. night showdown with the Boston Bruins. The Lightning beat the Bruins by a 6-3 final in their only prior 2015-16 meeting, played on Oct. 12 in Boston.
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.