By Jake Ricker
The Lightning took on the Philadelphia Flyers last night as they looked to snap their five-game losing streak. Victor Hedman would not play in this game after suffering an injury against the Hurricanes, while Erik Cernak would make his return. Here are a few things we noticed from the win.
Michael Eyssimont
Eyssimont had his best game as a Bolt. Yes, we are working with a very small sample size, but Eyssimont was all over the ice and was shooting the puck every chance he got. He also got in the mix after Deangelo speared Perry late in the third period. Eyssimont has yet to pick up a point in a Lightning uniform, but if he can continue to play at this fast pace, he should see a lot of offense coming his way.
Killorn/Kucherov
Since being benched, Kucherov has been on a mission. He continues to make his passes look effortless and has even been very efficient in his backchecking. Kucherov had two goals and one assist in last night's game. All three of those points came on the power play, which had a lot of success against the Flyers.
Alex Killorn also had a three-point night with two goals coming on the power play. Killorns first goal came off of one of Kucherovs famous slap passes. Killorn is one point shy of 50, which is the 5th best on the team. Killorn can tend to run under the radar but continues to be solid offensively, and this time makes a big impact on the power play. This comes after having not seen time on the man advantage for the last few weeks.
Defense
The Lightning's defense has been the biggest issue during their losing streak. Tonight we saw some improvement. It is important to keep in mind that the Lightning were without victor Hedman, and Cernak was just coming back from injury. Overall the Lightning were able to limit most of the Flyer's chances but still had some bad turnovers. One of these was when Cernak tried to dump the puck into the offensive zone but instead had it blocked, which lead to an odd-man rush and then the game-opening goal.
The Lightning defense tends to have a very offensive mind leading to a lot of situations where they find themselves out of position. There were, however, a few times last night when the Lightning were much more aware of their surrounding and were able to get back defensively when needed. There is still a lot of work to be done, but the defense was able to hold the Flyers to just two goals which is an improvement compared to the last few weeks.
Final Thoughts
Was it the perfect game? No. But this is exactly what the doctor ordered. Especially liked what we saw from the bottom 6. The Lightning get a much-needed win and can hopefully build from this moving forward.
Three Stars
Media’s three stars
1. Killorn (2G, 1 A)
2. Kucherov (2G, 1A)
3. Eyssimont (3 HITS, 4S)
Our three stars
1. Killorn (2G, 1 A)
2. Kucherov (2G, 1A)
3. Sergachev (2A)
The Lightning's next game will be against the Vegas Golden Knights on Thursday, March 8th, at 7:00 PM ET.
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