By Michael Wax
The Lightning got a massive win in the first half of their back-to-back, holding off an Islanders rally in the third period and winning 4-2. With the collop of Max Crozier before the game, the Lightning opted to go 11 forwards and seven defensemen. Here's how they stacked up:
Hagel-Point-Kucherov
Eyssimont-Cirelli-Chaffee
Stamkos-Paul-Sheary
Glendening-Motte
Hedman-Raddysh
de Haan-Cernak
Lilleberg-Perbix
Crozier
Vasilevskiy in goal.
Here are our three biggest takeaways:
G-Man
There are certainly games where the fans would look at the recipient of the empty net goal and say, “he deserved that.” " In this one, Luke Glendening put together one of his best games in a lightning uniform in route and was rewarded with an empty netter to help the Lightning defeat the Islanders. Glendening was crucial on the penalty kill, helping the Lightning against five minor calls against them throughout the game. Some of these penalty calls were against the Lightning's better penalty killers, giving Glendening an even more prominent role. Glendening's 4:48 of shorthanded ice time was not only almost half of his total ice time but was second-most among forwards and only five seconds behind leader Anthony Cirelli.
Glendening's reward for his big-time play in the game was finalizing the Lightning’s win during a big Islanders push in the third period. With less than a minute ago, Victor Hedman got the puck into open space, and Glendening was the first one to it before shooting it into the empty net and sealing the victory for the Lightning.
That goal was Glendening's ninth of the year, tying his goal total from 2022-23 and putting themselves only three goals back of tying his career high for goals in a season, coming at age 34. Glendening has been a revelation for the Lightning's bottom six in his defensive prowess, but in turn, the Lightning are giving him an offensive boost that he hasn’t seen in years.
Big Swede
In the preview video for our YouTube channel, I brought up that Victor Hedman had only had four assists in his last eight games and had been on the ice for more goals against than he had goals for. In response, Hedman put up another three-point game against the Islanders for his fifth three-point game of the season and stepped up.
Hedman's first assist came when he fed Nikita Kucherov for a one-timer from the center point. Hedman’s positioning came about after pinching to get a shot creation for a rebound, and when the puck slid to him again, he found Kucherov at the top.
His second assist came as more of a beneficiary than anything, dropping the puck back to Brayden Point on the power play before Point and Kucherov provided each other with a give-and-go. Finally, Hedman recorded the primary assist on Glendening's empty netter, which was discussed previously.
Flipped Script
Perhaps the most surprising part of the game overall was that the Lightning, who had been notoriously awful in road second periods this year, had one of the best road second periods of the season. While they were outshot New York 9-6, they outscored the Islanders 1-0 and outchanced them 19-11 at 5-on-5. Their goal came about on the power-play goal that Brayden Point scored.
When the Islanders did have pressure, the Lightning relied on Andrei Vasilevskiy's services to bail out the trouble.
This was a massive win for a team desperately in need of a win to both snap their streak and keep themselves ahead in the playoff race with teams like the Islanders and tomorrow's opponent, the Devils, behind them in the standings.
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