What started out looking like a promising night in Pittsburgh quickly unraveled for the Tampa Bay Lightning. The end result was a 4-2 loss at the hands of the Penguins.
That solid start manifested itself in the form of a 12-5 shot advantage in the first period. The Bolts were buzzing. They were creating scoring chances, manufacturing offense, and controlling possession. The problem for them was that Marc-Andre Fleury was in the Pittsburgh net to thwart them at every opportunity. He made a number of key saves that kept the game scoreless until he teammates could pounce.
And pounce they did.
Despite having exactly zero momentum at the time, Brandon Sutter was able to score a shorthanded goal at 19:09 of the first to put the Penguins up 1-0. A rare miscue from Victor Hedman allowed Sutter to race onto the puck, skate into the Lightning zone, and fire the puck past Bishop. Perhaps the worst part of that sequence for the Bolts, and Bishop in particular, was that the shot was likely going wide until it hit the nob of Bishop’s stick and changed direction.
Rather than coast into the intermission down by one, the Lightning got a little bit lucky and answered right back. Still on that same power play, Jonathan Drouin found the puck in the slot and slid it past Fleury for the score. That goal tied things up at one, and allowed every member of Bolts Nation to exhale.
Then things fell apart.
As the second period commenced, one player was noticeably absent from the Lightning armada. That player was Ben Bishop. Rather than Big Ben, Evgeni Nabokov skated out to the Tampa crease to start the middle frame. Bishop was diagnosed with a lower body injury and did not return to the game.
It didn’t take long for the Penguins to take advantage of a cold Nabokov, as Bryan Rust scored his first NHL goal just 2:55 into the second. A mishap between Nabokov and Brian Boyle allowed Rust to take the puck all alone in the slot and wire the puck past an unprepared Nabokov. Just like that it was 2-1 Penguins.
That strong gust that had been powering the Lightning’s sails in the first period was more like a soft summer breeze after the Rust goal. Not only did the Bishop injury hurt the Lightning, but so did the fact that the Penguins’s play really picked up in period two. The Lightning struggled to generate chances, and when they did Fleury was able to make the saves.
Being down by one with 20 minutes left on the clock isn’t the worst situation in the world, even for a Lightning team that was 0-9 when trailing after two periods heading into the Pittsburgh contest. A one-goal deficit is manageable. A two-goal deficit is more problematic. Unfortunately for the Bolts, a late Steve Downie power play goal made it a 3-1 game. A bad bounce off Matt Carle’s head (yes, his head) set Downie up for the score. That marker, for all intents and purposes, ended the game.
The first 17 minutes of the third period brought more of the same for both the Lightning and Penguins. Pittsburgh was able to tighten its grasp on things, while the Bolts deflated in a very noticeable way.
Brian Dumoulin scored his first NHL goal at 7:47 to make it a 4-1 game, and from there the Penguins just ran down the clock. That one basically sealed the deal. A late goal from Nikita Kucherov to make it 4-2 with about three minutes left wasn’t enough.
With Bishop in need of an evaluation, there’s a good chance that the team will call up one of its young guys from the Syracuse Crunch. Lightning fans will either be reacquainted with Kristers Gudlevskis, or introduced to Andrei Vasilevskiy. Either way, any situation that involves a Bishop injury is a bad one for the Lightning.
The good news? If all else fails…
Of course, Lindback is available. pic.twitter.com/oMi9DhohUL
— Bolt Prospects (@BoltProspects) December 16, 2014As always, thanks for reading.
Michael Stuart has been the Tampa Bay Lightning writer for HockeyBuzz since 2012. Visit his archive to read more or follow him on Twitter.