Even in dominating fashion, Tampa Bay Lightning make it hard on themselves

by Erik Erlendsson | @Erik_Erlendsson | Like us on Facebook
February 4, 2017

TAMPA, Fla. – There was almost a sense of a wiped brow of relief coming out of the Lightning locker room on Saturday.

In the worst way, Tampa Bay needed a victory. It should have come easy against the Anaheim Ducks. The result should never have been in doubt.

The Lightning played that well.

Yet, it took a dramatic turnaround in the shootout to help Tampa Bay secure an important victory, triumphant 3-2 over the Ducks in a game that never should have been extended past regulation.

{mprestriction ids=”1,2″}

In a season that has seen few full-game efforts, Tampa Bay put forth one of them on Saturday. Sure, the Ducks played on Friday in Sunrise, falling in overtime to the Panthers. But these are the times the Lightning need to take advantage of team coming in on a back-to-back situation.

And by the stat sheet and the eye test, that’s exactly what happened. The Lightning outshot the Ducks 37-16 for the game and 30-7 from the second period on. Tampa Bay had 82 shot attempts (shots on goal, plus shot attempts blocked plus missed shots) compared to 39 for Anaheim. Even in the faceoff circle, where the Ducks are the best team in the league and dominated Tampa Bay in the last meeting, the Lightning won 54 percent of the draws (and there were a lot of them) going 36-for-66.

In the second period alone, Tampa Bay had a 15-4 shot advantage, holding the Ducks without a shot on goal for the 18 minutes, 28 seconds. And had Nikita Kucherov not taken a penalty halfway through a four-minute power play chance, the Lightning likely would have held an opponent without a shot on goal for a full period for the third time in franchise history. In total, the Ducks went 24 minutes, 19 seconds between shots on goal.

”I thought we played a pretty solid game,’’ center Tyler Johnson said. “We had a lot of scoring chances. I think we maybe hit two or three posts throughout. An inch here or there, that changes the score a little bit. I thought we were good in the defensive zone. I thought the D were helping the forwards. The forwards were helping the D and we just kept on rolling.’’

Yet, even that was not enough to put a fatigued opponent away.

The Lightning were only able to score one goal in the second period – Alex Killorn’s power play goal at 10:56 – despite the dominant effort and only held a 2-1 lead heading in to the second intermission. And, as happens more times than teams like to admit, when that sort of domination is not rewarded with more output, it comes back to burn a team.

That was the case when Ryan Getzlaf outmuscled Andrej Sustr along the boards and ripped a shot past Ben Bishop at 4:02 to tie the game.

It was just one of three shots on goal Anaheim had in the third period, and it was enough to keep the game tied after regulation, even as Tampa Bay had 10 shots on goal and a power play chance to try to win the game midway through.

Tampa Bay’s dominant effort continued in the overtime, getting five shots on goal – Kucherov hit a post, one of four on the night Tampa Bay hit – while keeping Anaheim off the board. Still wasn’t enough for victory.

Even in the shootout, the Lightning nearly saw things fall apart for them after Brayden Point converted the opening attempt as Jacob Silvferberg and Getzlaf converted their chances to give the Ducks a 2-1 lead heading in to the final round of the shootout. It took Kucherov converting on a backhand attempt and Bishop stopping Richard Rackell to keep hope alive.

It was finally in the fourth round, as Brian Boyle converted his chance and Corey Perry hit the post, that Tampa Bay secured an important victory.

”We need that, it’s the only way we are going to have any hope of getting back in to this thing,’’ Lightning head coach Jon Cooper said.

The victory did little to help Tampa Bay’s place in the standings, still occupying the cellar spot in the Eastern Conference, tied with Buffalo in points. But what it might have served is offer just a glimpse of light in what has been a dark season to this point.

”It’s a proud group in there, and they were not to be denied tonight,’’ Cooper said. “Angry, determined, whatever you want to say. They had it all. It was fun to watch. It was an entertaining game. If you’re going to give up a point, give it up to a Western Conference team. I’m sure the other Western Conference teams aren’t happy about it, but we don’t really care. We needed the two, and we got them.’’

.

Postgame notes:. Tampa Bay improved to 8-0-5 in the past 13 meetings against Anaheim. Tampa Bay’s last regulation loss to the Ducks came Dec. 9, 2006. … G Ben Bishop improved to 7-0-2 all-time against the Ducks and has yet to allow more than two goals in any game. … LW Ondrej Palat missed the game with an undisclosed lower-body injury and is listed as day-to-day. … C Brayden Point improved to 4-for-5 in shootout attempts this season. … C Brian Boyle improved to 2-for-3 in his shootout attempts on the season. … D Andrej Sust was back in the lineup after being a healthy scratch on Thursday. … D Luke Witkowski was a healthy scratch. … C Tyler Johnson recorded his 199th career point with an assist on Jonathan Drouin’s goal. … G Ben Bishop has allowed six shootout goals on 17 attempts this season. …

My three stars:
1.Lightning RW Nikita Kucherov – Two assists, shootout tying goal, 10 shot attempts

2.Lighting LW Jonathan Drouin – Goal, 15 shot attempts, 22:15 of ice time

3.Ducks G Jonathan Bernier – Finished with 35 saves, all five in overtime