The Tampa Bay Lightning visit the Columbus Blue Jackets at Nationwide Arena on Thursday, November 12, 2026, with puck drop set for 7:00\u202fPM EST.<\/p>\n
Matchup: Tampa Bay Lightning (12-4-2, 26 points in 2026-27) at Columbus Blue Jackets (7-9-0, 14 points in 2026-27)<\/p>\n
Date: Thursday, November 12, 2026<\/p>\n
Puck drop: 7:00\u202fPM EST<\/p>\n
Venue: Nationwide Arena<\/p>\n
How to watch: CBJ: WWHO, CBJHN, CBJNHL \u00b7 TBL: The Spot<\/p>\n
Tampa Bay Lightning News & Notes<\/p>\n
Tampa Bay closed out its road trip stop in Buffalo with an 8-3 win on Wednesday, with Nikita Kucherov scoring a natural hat trick in the third period. John Carlson had a five-point night, reaching 800 career points in the process. The eight-goal output was the club\u2019s largest of the trip, and the Lightning now continue on to Columbus, where they face the Blue Jackets on Thursday night. <\/p>\n
The hat trick added to a body of work built entirely in one uniform. Kucherov, selected 58th overall by Tampa Bay in the 2011 draft, has played 891 games across 13 seasons with the Lightning, collecting 1,139 points on 405 goals and 734 assists, along with two Hart Trophies, three Art Ross Trophies and two Stanley Cups. He won the Hart last season after a 130-point campaign in 76 games that included 44 goals and a plus-43 rating. <\/p>\n
Columbus Blue Jackets News & Notes<\/p>\n
Conor Garland will not face Florida and is out indefinitely with an upper-body injury, according to Blue Jackets beat reporter Aaron Portzline, leaving Columbus to reshuffle its forward group again. The absence removes a top-six option at a point when the club is already working through lineup changes. Separately, Columbus has been listening to trade offers on Dmitri Voronkov, with the power forward drawing interest from other clubs since late October. <\/p>\n
Tampa Bay Lightning Projected Lines<\/p>\n
Line 1: Brandon Hagel \u2013 Anthony Cirelli \u2013 Nikita Kucherov<\/p>\n
Line 2: Jake Guentzel \u2013 Sam O\u2019Reilly \u2013 Yanni Gourde<\/p>\n
Line 3: Ilya Mikheyev \u2013 Zemgus Girgensons \u2013 Pontus Holmberg<\/p>\n
Line 4: Jeffrey Viel \u2013 Conor Geekie \u2013 Scott Sabourin<\/p>\n
Pair 1: Ryan McDonagh \u2013 Erik Cernak<\/p>\n
Pair 2: Charle-Edouard D\u2019Astous \u2013 John Carlson<\/p>\n
Pair 3: Victor Hedman \u2013 J.J. Moser<\/p>\n
Goaltenders: Andrei Vasilevskiy \u2013 Dennis Hildeby<\/p>\n
Tampa Bay Lightning Special Teams<\/p>\n
Power play, First unit: Jake Guentzel \u2013 Sam O\u2019Reilly \u2013 Nikita Kucherov \u2013 John Carlson \u2013 Charle-Edouard D\u2019Astous<\/p>\n
Power play, Second unit: Conor Geekie \u2013 Anthony Cirelli \u2013 Pontus Holmberg \u2013 Brandon Hagel \u2013 Victor Hedman<\/p>\n
Penalty kill, First unit: Anthony Cirelli \u2013 Brandon Hagel \u2013 Ryan McDonagh \u2013 Erik Cernak<\/p>\n
Penalty kill, Second unit: Zemgus Girgensons \u2013 Ilya Mikheyev \u2013 Victor Hedman \u2013 J.J. Moser<\/p>\n
Columbus Blue Jackets Projected Lines<\/p>\n
Line 1: Matthew Knies \u2013 Sean Monahan \u2013 Kent Johnson<\/p>\n
Line 2: Dmitri Voronkov \u2013 Adam Fantilli \u2013 Valeri Nichushkin<\/p>\n
Line 3: Cole Sillinger \u2013 Charlie Coyle \u2013 Mathieu Olivier<\/p>\n
Line 4: Ryan Lomberg \u2013 Jack Williams \u2013 Steven Lorentz<\/p>\n
Pair 1: Zach Werenski \u2013 Damon Severson<\/p>\n
Pair 2: Ivan Provorov \u2013 Denton Mateychuk<\/p>\n
Pair 3: Dante Fabbro \u2013 Erik Gudbranson<\/p>\n
Goaltenders: Cam Talbot \u2013 Jet Greaves<\/p>\n
Columbus Blue Jackets Special Teams<\/p>\n
Power play, First unit: Matthew Knies \u2013 Sean Monahan \u2013 Charlie Coyle \u2013 Zach Werenski \u2013 Kent Johnson<\/p>\n
Power play, Second unit: Valeri Nichushkin \u2013 Adam Fantilli \u2013 Dmitri Voronkov \u2013 Denton Mateychuk \u2013 Ivan Provorov<\/p>\n
Penalty kill, First unit: Sean Monahan \u2013 Valeri Nichushkin \u2013 Denton Mateychuk \u2013 Ivan Provorov<\/p>\n
Penalty kill, Second unit: Charlie Coyle \u2013 Mathieu Olivier \u2013 Zach Werenski \u2013 Damon Severson<\/p>\n
Players To Watch<\/p>\n
Jake Guentzel \u2014 Tampa Bay Lightning<\/p>\n
Guentzel put up four assists on just one shot last time out, so the finishing touch may still be coming. Box Score Junkie has him at a 63.4% Corsi-for with 74.0 shot attempts for per 60 this season, plus 10 goals on 7.4 expected. With Brayden Point on IR, his minutes and shot volume should only grow.<\/p>\n
Zach Werenski \u2014 Columbus Blue Jackets<\/p>\n
Werenski fired six shots in 28:02 last game without getting on the scoresheet, and that workload makes him the Blue Jackets\u2019 most reliable shots-on-goal prop. Box Score Junkie credits him with 11.3 high-danger expected goals generated while on the ice this season, though just two goals on 3.1 of his own expected.<\/p>\n
Injury Report<\/p>\n
Tampa Bay Lightning<\/p>\n
Erik Cernak (D) \u2014 Out, Undisclosed, expected back Saturday, November 14<\/p>\n
Brayden Point (C) \u2014 Injured Reserve, Undisclosed, expected back Wednesday, December 2<\/p>\n
Columbus Blue Jackets: no report available.<\/p>\n
Betting Odds<\/p>\n
Moneyline (DraftKings, as of November 12 at 4:12\u202fAM ET): Tampa Bay Lightning -118, Columbus Blue Jackets -102.<\/p>\n
Odds change through the day; check the sportsbook before betting. 21+. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER.<\/p>\n
Next Up<\/p>\n
Tampa Bay Lightning: host the Detroit Red Wings on Saturday, November 14.<\/p>\n
Columbus Blue Jackets: host the Philadelphia Flyers on Saturday, November 14.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Tampa Bay Lightning visit the Columbus Blue Jackets at Nationwide Arena on Thursday, November 12, 2026, with…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":710210,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5105],"tags":[73000,230,5,5236,1331,281,189,3714,2912,4,5573,1335,540,92,5168,5167,2566],"class_list":["post-710209","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tampa-bay-lightning","tag-2026-27-nhl-regular-season","tag-columbus-blue-jackets","tag-hockey","tag-injury-report","tag-jake-guentzel","tag-john-carlson","tag-lightning","tag-line-combinations","tag-nationwide-arena","tag-nhl","tag-nhl-game-preview","tag-nikita-kucherov","tag-tampa-bay","tag-tampa-bay-lightning","tag-tampabay","tag-tampabaylightning","tag-zach-werenski"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/117606796690723644","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/710209","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=710209"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/710209\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/710210"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=710209"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=710209"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=710209"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}