On the Forecheck<\/a><\/p>\nFor much of the season, the Tampa Bay Lightning have been lagging behind the rest of the league in terms of games played. Entering today\u2019s play, only San Jose (71 games) have suited up fewer times as the Bolts are in a group of teams that have 72 games under their belt. The team they are chasing, the Buffalo Sabres, have played 74, but today the Lightning cash in one of those games.<\/p>\n
Buffalo, who picked up a shootout win on Saturday night, get to do whatever folks in Buffalo do when they have a few days off as they don\u2019t play again until Tuesday. So, the Lightning have a chance to even the points total (and move ahead of them by percentage points) with a win over Nashville today. The thing about games in hand is that a team eventually has to play them. In order to make them worthwhile, the Lightning have to actually win the game.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s rare that a team playing on a back-to-back with an early start time is considered a more rested team, but that\u2019s the case for the Lightning as they won their game in the bright sunshine of day. Meanwhile, the Predators played at 7:00 PM last night, in Nashville. Then they had to jump on a plane and fly to Tampa. That\u2019s a shame.<\/p>\n
Nashville comes in clinging to the second Wild Card spot in the Western Conference, but on a two-game losing streak. Their lead over Los Angeles has shrunk to one point while they now trail Utah by five points. So, like every other team that has darkened the Lightning\u2019s doorstep over the last few weeks, they are desperate for points. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe urgency level has to rise, though\u2026 We\u2019ve got to find the urgency. And with those things comes the execution. If you don\u2019t execute, you can\u2019t play fast. We didn\u2019t play fast tonight.\u201d<\/p>\n
Nope, that\u2019s not Coach Jon Cooper talking about the Lightning, who have somehow picked up points in four games that they\u2019ve started off trailing by multiple goals. That was Predators\u2019 head coach Andrew Brunette (8 goals in 32 career games against the Lightning) speaking after Nashville\u2019s 4-1 loss to Montreal. <\/p>\n
Both teams will be looking to get off to a good start. Yes, the Lightning have shown a remarkable ability to come from behind in these games, but it\u2019s not a sustainable habit, especially in the playoffs when teams playing with a lead know how to lock things down. Whatever they do during the first intermission should probably be moved to warm-ups.<\/p>\n
The Lightning managed to score four goals yesterday without the services Nikita Kucherov, who was out with an illness along with Nick Paul, and it seems 50\/50 that he\u2019ll be in the line-up today. Coach Cooper was non-committal following the game last night. Scott Sabourin and Steven Santini filled in as the Lightning went 11\/7.<\/p>\n
Well, it was more like 11\/6 as Santini played less than two minutes. It didn\u2019t appear that the defenseman was hurt on any of his three shifts, but he didn\u2019t appear after the first period. There is a good chance that the flow of the game, and the effectiveness of the defensive pairings (especially the Emil Lilleberg\/Charle-Edouard D\u2019Astous combination) kept him on the bench as the Lightning started and completed the comeback.<\/p>\n
Being able to better manage their lines would be another benefit to playing with a lead. Three forwards (Brandon Hagel, Brayden Point, and Gage Goncalves) played more than 20 minutes yesterday. Two others (Anthony Cirelli and Jake Guentzel) were almost there. With the condensed schedule, that\u2019s a good way to burn out a few players. <\/p>\n
It\u2019s always good to see Steven Stamkos in the building, even if he\u2019s wearing the wrong colors. The 35-year-old is having a bounce back season with 36 goals, including a league-leading 10 game-winning goals. He\u2019s scored five times in the last five games as he\u2019s trying to help carry this team into the playoffs. <\/p>\n
It looks like it will be a battle of the back-ups as Andrei Vasilevskiy went for the Lightning and Juuse Saros was in net for the Predators. Justus Annunen has played twice against Tampa Bay, posting an 0-2-0 record with a .830 SV% and a 6.16 GAA. <\/p>\n
Potential Lines<\/p>\n
Tampa Bay Lightning<\/p>\n
Forwards:<\/p>\n
Gage GoncalvesBrayden PointJake GuentzelBrandon HagelAnthony CirelliNikita Kucherov (?)Zemgus GirgensonsYanni GourdePontus HolmbergCorey PerryNick Paul (?)Oliver Bjorkstrand<\/p>\n
Defense:<\/p>\n
J.J. MoserDarren RaddyshRyan McDonaghErik CernakCharle-Edouard D\u2019AstousEmil Lilleberg<\/p>\n
Goaltenders:<\/p>\n
Jonas JohanssonAndrei Vasilevskiy<\/p>\n
Nashville Predators<\/p>\n
Forwards:<\/p>\n
Steven StamkosRyan O\u2019ReillyLuke EvangelistaFilip ForsbergMatthew WoodJonathan MarchessaultZachary L\u2019HeureuxErik HaulaTyson JostReid SchaeferFedor SvechkovOzzy Weisblatt<\/p>\n
Defense:<\/p>\n
Brady SkjeiRoman JosiNicolas HagueAdam WilsbyNick PerbixRyan Ufko<\/p>\n
Goaltenders:<\/p>\n
Justus AnnunenJuuse Saros<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Game 73: Nashville Predators (34-30-9) at Tampa Bay Lightning (45-21-6) Time: 5:00 PM EST Location: Benchmark International Arena,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":529585,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5105],"tags":[5,189,4,540,92,5168,5167],"class_list":{"0":"post-529584","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tampa-bay-lightning","8":"tag-hockey","9":"tag-lightning","10":"tag-nhl","11":"tag-tampa-bay","12":"tag-tampa-bay-lightning","13":"tag-tampabay","14":"tag-tampabaylightning"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116313505452837930","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/529584","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=529584"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/529584\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/529585"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=529584"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=529584"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=529584"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}