By Jake Ricker
The Tampa Bay Lightning came into tonight looking to extend their winning streak to three against the Washington Capitals on the road. Here is how they stacked up.
Paul - Point - Kucherov
Hagel - Cirelli - Stamkos
Jeannot - Glendening - Sheary
Eyssimont - Motte - Barré-Boulet
Hedman - Perbix
Fleury - Cernak
de Haan - Raddysh
Vasilevskiy
Here are the biggest takeaways from the Lightning's 2-1 shootout win over the Capitals.
Second Period
Coming into tonight, the Lightning had outscored their opponents 6-0 in the second period over their last two games. The Capitals ended that streak scoring once in the period and tying the game. Things seemed to get worse when the Capitals scored again but were later called back because of an offsides.
It certainly wasn't the worst second period, but the Lightning gave the Capitals a lot of opportunities. Vasilevskiy was there to help them out, but they certainly would like to see the Lightning get back to their play in the second like it was against the Blues and Knights.
Andrei Vasilevskiy
Vasilevskiy was great tonight, giving up just one goal in regulation. He made a lot of big saves, especially in overtime when the Lightning struggled to get possession of the puck and gave up odd-man rushes. While Vasy's numbers aren't where we are used to seeing them for a guy who just came back from back surgery, he continues to play extremely well and was a big reason the Lightning got the win tonight.
Offense
The Lightning were able to put up a ton of scoring from all over the lineup in their past two games. They were not able to continue that tonight. Some credit has to go to Capitals goaltender Lindgren who made some big saves on Lightning players.
Luckily for the Lightning, it was their depth scoring that still found the back of the net as Luke Glendening made a great tip early in the first. Glendening was one of the best players for the Lightning, scoring and winning 70% of his faceoffs in this game. There were some opportunities where it looked like the lightning went back to passing too much, but one game is not the be-all and end-all.
Final thoughts
No, it was not a perfect game for the Lightning. In fact, it was probably the worst of the three this week. However, Vasilevskiy played great, and the Lightning stayed in it and picked up another huge win against an opponent ahead of them in the wild-card race. This win now puts the Lightning into a wild card spot despite having a few more games played than most teams.
The Lightning can now take this three-game winning streak, take some much-deserved rest, and look to pick things back up against the Panthers on December 30th.
Three Stars
Media's three-stars
1. Vasilevskiy (32 SV)
2. Lindgren (19 SV)
3. Mantha (1G)
Our three-stars
1. Vasilevskiy (32 SV)
2. Lindgren (19 SV)
3. Glendening (1G)
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