It might be difficult to think of a team that has gone to three straight Stanley Cup finals and having won two titles as needing to take positives out of losses as the regular season winds down.
Alas, wins have been difficult to come by for the Tampa Bay Lightning. Starting with a 1-0 shootout loss at Arizona on February 15, the Bolts are in the midst of a 4-6-4 stretch in which they have scored three goals or less in nine of the 14 games.
“I think we have enough guys in this room that have played for a long time and understand the ebbs and flows of a season,” said Alex Killorn, following a 3-2 loss to visiting Winnipeg on Sunday evening.
Because of the points they piled up prior to the all-star break, the Lightning remain in third in the Atlantic Division, four points behind the Maple Leafs, who have one game in hand heading into Tuesday night’s action. Barring a collapse of monumental proportions by either club, Tampa Bay and Toronto will tangle in the first round of the playoffs for a second straight spring.
Carelessness in all three zones has too often left goalies Andrei Vasilevskiy and Brian Elliott fending for themselves, and not just during the aforementioned 14-game span, but much of this season. The latest example was during Sunday’s match when Winnipeg had three third-period breakaways. Vasilevskiy, not the least bit surprising, had the answer each time.
The Lightning cannot continue to rely on No. 88 to bail them out, though. Tightening up down the stretch is going to be imperative if the Bolts are to have another lengthy playoff run. The loss to the Jets concluded a four-game homestand – also the Flyers, Golden Knights and Blackhawks — in which Tampa Bay generally looked better in picking up five out of a possible eight points.
“Are we a better team now than we were game one of this homestand?” said coach Jon Cooper following Sunday’s game. “No question. Is it disappointing to get only five of eight points? It is.”
A 4-3 overtime loss to Vegas last Thursday was a game Cooper felt his team should have won. The Winnipeg game was one he thought the team played well enough to earn at least one point, but failing to capitalize on a 5-on-3 for 1:02 during the back half of the second period proved to be vital to the outcome.
“We let a couple (of points) slide off the table,” Cooper said of the homestand. “That’s going to happen. Teams are going to take points from you. You are going to get points in games that maybe you didn’t deserve them. We got five of eight and now we have to go on the road and get (some points) of our own.”
That will a tough task as a quirk in the schedule has Tampa Bay remaining in New Jersey for two dates with the Devils, on Tuesday and Thursday evenings. (They also host the Devils on Sunday, making the three-game season series between the teams one that is wrapped up in six days.)
The Devils entered play this week with 94 points and battling the Carolina Hurricanes for the top spot in the Metropolitan Division. They are an opponent the Lightning cannot afford to be careless against.
“You can’t get cute on the road,” said Corey Perry, whose 12 goals this season give him 417 for his career. “It’s (about playing) simple, boring hockey. New Jersey is playing well and they have a lot of skill on that team. They are feeling it. We’re in one city, one spot for a week. It could be good for us.”
Make no mistake: There were positives on a homestand in which Tampa Bay outshot and out-chanced the opposition in each of the four games, and convincingly so in three of them.
“You just want to keep getting better as a team,” said Killorn, who has three 20-goal seasons in the last four. “I think the past couple of games we have been playing better hockey, not giving up as much. We have been breaking out with the puck a lot better.”
The Lightning need to carry that over to the games in Newark, and especially if they have to open the postseason on the road in Toronto again. Indeed, life on the road for a Tampa Bay team has not come easy as a 15-16-1 mark would suggest.
“We have done really well at home, but getting ready for playoffs you need to be a good team on the road,” said Killorn. “Maybe it is keeping things a little more simple.”
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With Wins Difficult To Come By, Tampa Bay Lightning Seek To Build On Positives - Forbes
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