Tampa Bay Lightning play like the Alpha against last place Arizona

by Erik Erlendsson | @Erik_Erlendsson | Like us on Facebook
December 14, 2017

Last season, the Tampa Bay Lightning played like dogs in the desert.

On Thursday, the top team in the league played like the Alpha.

Brayden Point recorded a Gordie Howe hat trick, Tyler Johnson had another multi-point effort and Nikita Kucherov scored again to lead the Lightning to a 4-1 victory against Arizona at Gila River Arena. Tampa Bay has won a season-best six consecutive games and continue to pace the league with 23 wins and 48 points.

But after Tampa Bay took care of business with a 4-1 victory at Arizona, the Lightning now await word on one of their top forwards, who left the game in the third period with an apparent arm injury.

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The victory was tempered when Ryan Callahan appeared to suffer a potential long-term injury late in the game.

Callahan was in on the forecheck when he got tangled up with Arizona defenseman Oliver Ekman-Larsson at the 7:01 mark of the third period. Ekman-Larsson had a hold of Callahan’s right arm and pulled him down as he lost balance along the end boards. Callahan was in immediate stress while down on the ice, grabbing his arm while his legs were shaking. Though he was able to get up under his own power, Callahan was favoring his right arm as he made his way to the locker room and did not return.

The team did not provide any sort of an official update on Callahan’s condition, but head coach Jon Cooper was asked about it after the game and did not sound encouraged.

”This one might be longer than day to day,’’ Cooper said. “He’ll get looked at again (on Friday). It was an unfortunate incident and hopefully everything’s going be okay but we’ll know more (Friday).’’

”It makes me sick to my stomach to watch a guy work hard to come back (after missing Tuesday’s game) and play as well as he did and then have something like that . . . it didn’t look very good,’’ captain Steven Stamkos said.

Up until that point, the Lightning were rolling along and doing exactly what you would expect the top team in the league to do to the 31st overall team. Tampa Bay was zipping the puck around, looking like it was a power play when it was 5-on-5. Then when it was the power play, it looked like the Harlem Globetrotters against the Washington Coyotes, er, Generals.

And it was during that first power play that the Lightning broke through as Sweet Georgia Brown could faintly be heard in the background if you listened closely. Tampa Bay had the Coyotes’ turning every which way but loose trying to chase the puck around the zone as the Lightning were passing it around with ease and retrieving the puck just as easily when there were opportunities.

It was during one of those spectacular passing sequences that Vladislav Namestnikov broke through, pouncing on a loose puck in the slot after Antti Raanta made a phenomenal stick save to rob Steven Stamkos of a goal. Namestnikov found the puck in the crease and gave Tampa Bay a 1-0 lead at 11:30 of the first period on his 13th of the season.

Point made it 2-0 just 41 seconds later as he was sent in to the zone alone from a pass by Ondrej Palat and slipped a backhand under the pads of Raanta for his 14th of the season. Point has now scored in a career-best five consecutive games.

Kucherov made it 3-0 at the 6:11 mark of the second period and the rout was on. While Clayton Keller scored on the power play to make it 3-1 at 11:29 of the second, Tyler Johnson erased all doubt with his eighth goal coming 31 seconds in to the third period.

Things got a bit edgy in the third, starting with Point completing the Gordie Howe hat trick after he and Brad Richardson got tangled up at 2:38 and decided to drop the gloves. It was Point’s first career fight in the NHL and his first, according to hockeyfights.com, since March of 2016 while with Moose Jaw in the Western Hockey League.

”I wasn’t looking for that, to be sure, but sometimes it just happens,’’ Point said. “I was happy I was just able to stand in there and do okay.’’

It was something that caught some around the Lightning locker room off guard.

”That was surprising,’’ Stamkos said. “He got the Gordie Howe hat trick. It’s good to see him stick up for himself, and he’s played very well. Another great game by that line as well.’’

Later in the period, after Max Domi got an elbow up high on Mikhail Sergachev behind the Tampa Bay net, Anton Stralman went to have some words with the young Arizona forward. That ended up with Chris Kunitz dropping the gloves with Nick Cousins at 9:21.

By the end, it was an Alpha-like performance from the Lightning, which remembered all too well they lost both games to Arizona last season, which proved a big factor in missing out on the postseason after Tampa Bay fell one point short of securing a playoff berth.

”You have to understand, when you miss the playoffs by a point, you start looking for answers,’’ Cooper said of last year’s meetings with the Coyotes. “What were games we could have won but couldn’t? When we went down the stretch last year, we had a 3-2 lead last year against these guys in our building and ended up losing the game. We look back at the game and think maybe that was the one that cost us the playoffs. Our locker room was well aware of that. (And) the (Coyotes are) getting better. We knew it. We see it on the tape. (Arizona head coach Rick Tocchet) has done a hell of a job bringing the guys to where they are. There was a lot of fear on our end. It’s good we got the lead when we did and held on to it.’’

Now, they just sit and await word on how much time Callahan is going to miss.

Postgame notes: C/RW Tyler Johnson extended his scoring streak to five games with multi-point efforts in the past four. … Point has the game-winning goal in three consecutive games becoming the first player in franchise history to accomplish the feat. Two other players – James Neal (Vegas) and Michael Raffl (Philadelphia) accomplished the feat earlier this year. … Kucherov has goals in three consecutive games and has five goals in the past six games. … Tampa Bay’s 48 shots on goal were a season high and most in a game since Jan. 21, 2017, against the same Coyotes team in Arizona. … Tampa Bay finished with 80 shot attempts. … Every Lightning player had at least one shot on goal.

My three stars:
1.Lightning C Brayden Point – Goal, assist, fight for the Gordie Howe hat trick

2.Lightning RW Tyler Johnson – Goal, assist, plus-1

3. Lightning D Victor Hedman Assist, plus-1, eight shots on goal, 13 shot attempts in 26:35 of ice time

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