By Michael Wax
The Lightning weren't able to win both halves of their back-to-back, falling 5-3 to the Toronto Maple Leafs on Saturday night.
Here are three things we saw from the loss:
The Cat's Boogyman
Andrei Vasilevskiy's overall play has bounced back in a big way this season. One thing that has continued to persist, however, is his struggles against the Leafs.
For the eighth time since the beginning of the 2021-22 season, Vasilevskiy allowed at least four goals to the Leafs (regular season and playoffs). It was also his second time recording this dubious stat this season, and some of these goals drained any momentum and atmosphere the Lightning tried to gain.
Considering Vasilevskiy was given an entire day off yesterday while the rest of the team was in Nashville, the results he displayed were the worst possible outcome. If he’s going to be rewarded with off days like this again, there has to be more substantial results against teams like the Leafs.
Man Down After Man Down
The injuries have been piling up for the Bolts, especially their forward core.
Nick Paul is out indefinitely, while Mitchell Chaffee has missed the last three games. Things got even worse in the Nashville game, with Anthony Cirelli and Nikita Kucherov missing time. While both came back in the game, it was evident that Kucherov was not himself, and his absence in this game only furthered the idea that he wasn't 100%.
Connor Sheary was recalled from Syracuse to take Kucherov‘s place, as the Lightning went with the 11/7 lineup format for the fifth game in a row. They’ve been able to nickel and dime their way through lineup changes with substantial pieces getting hurt recently, but the cumulative injuries are certainly showing themselves.
And New
There were a lot of records this year that the Lightning were looking forward to breaking. Some, like Andrei Vasilevskiy’s NHL record to 300 wins and Nikita Kucherov's 900 points, have already happened. But the next big milestone came tonight, and it was by someone who many fans would expect.
With his secondary assist on the Lightning's second goal in their furious effort to come back in this game, Victor Hedman recorded his 589th assist, passing Martin St. Louis for the most assists in Lightning history.
Headman did it in more games than St. Louis, but that was always to be expected from a defenseman. Hedman would even grab another assist to make it 590, solidifying his record even more during this game.
It’ll be interesting to see how long Hedman keeps this record, seeing as Kucherov has 575 assists already and has a more productive assist pace than Hedman. Still, for now, Hedman has etched himself into the Lightning record books.
コメント