Tampa Bay Lightning Collapse Under Pressure And Drop Game 3
The Tampa Bay Lightning offense fell flat tonight as the Detroit Red Wings shut out the Lightning in Game 3 at the Joe Louis Arena.
The Tampa Bay Lightning has been incredibly successful in the first two games of the 2016 Stanley Cup Playoffs; however, the Lightning had a whole new challenge in front of them tonight. The Tampa Bay Lightning will charge into enemy territory as they make their way to the Joe Louis Arena in Detroit to take on the Detroit Red Wings in Game 3.
As most of us know by now, Game 2 ended with quite a lot of chaos on the ice with what turned from a simple penalty into an all-out line brawl. There is no denying there is no love lost between these two teams, but with the way things came to a boil on Friday night, it was all but assured the rising tensions would spill over into tonight’s matchup.
When the puck dropped to start the first period of play, it looked as if both the Tampa Bay Lightning and Detroit Red Wings were on quite an even keel. Unfortunately, as the period progressed, as series of ill-timed penalties caused the Lightning to take a back seat to the Red Wings offense.
Once again, the Tampa Bay Lightning experienced a heck of a scare in the first period of play. As Tampa Bay Lightning defenseman Jason Garrison made his way along the boards behind the Tampa Bay Lightning’s net, he was blatantly slashed in the back of the knee by Red Wings center Joakim Andersson. As you can imagine, Garrison crumbled to the ice and had to be helped off the ice by two of his teammates.
Of course, there would be no call on the slash. Unfortunately, those of us here in the Bolts Nation who have been watching for the past couple of seasons have gotten all-too-used to this kind of situation. The good news to come out of this whole situation is Jason Garrison was able to rejoin his teammates on the ice for the start of the second period of play.
Unfortunately, the second period is where things started to take a turn for the worse. A series of early penalties caused the Tampa Bay Lightning to tire themselves out and open the door for the Red Wings offense to mount their attack. Just past the halfway point in the second period, the Red Wings would strike first blood with a goal from Red Wings center Andreas Athanasiou.
Just under five minutes later, Red Wings captain Henrik Zetterberg would take advantage of the Tampa Bay Lightning anemic passing game and give the Red Wings a two-goal lead in the latter minutes of the second period. If the Tampa Bay Lightning had any chance of taking a 3-0 lead in this series, they would have to come out on the ice in the third period ready to play aggressively with the puck and truly test Petr Mrazek.
Tonight’s encounter in Motown showed us something we never thought we’d see. For three consecutive games, the Tampa Bay Lightning’s penalty kill has been on point, yet when it comes to 5-on-5 the Lightning simply couldn’t find a way to get the job done. On the bright side, given the amount of penalties the Lightning took tonight, a strong penalty kill is the difference between a 2-0 and a 10-0 game.
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Despite the pleas of the fans, the Tampa Bay Lightning continued to take costly penalties and found themselves completely unable to mount any sort of an offense, leaving Petr Mrazek largely untested in goal. When the final buzzer sounded, the Detroit Red Wings would shut out the Tampa Bay Lightning 2-0. The series now stands at 2-0 Lightning.
Much like the ending to Game 2, the Tampa Bay Lightning and Detroit Red Wings found themselves embroiled in fisticuffs as the game came to an end. One of the highlights of the night was laughing hysterically as Justin Abdelkader, who already has his name embossed in the minds of the Lightning, decided to take a run at Brian Boyle. It almost looked like something out of a Looney Toons cartoon.
On the bright side, if there even is one after the way the team played tonight, the Tampa Bay Lightning now has an opportunity to finish off this series at the Amalie Arena in front of their hometown crowd. That has to count for something, right?
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The Tampa Bay Lightning may have dropped the ball in this game, but there is still plenty of hockey left to play in this series for the Lightning to get back on the right track. After a day off tomorrow, the Tampa Bay Lightning will head back into the Joe Louis Arena to do it all over again on Tuesday night in Game 4 of the Stanley Cup Playoffs. Hopefully, we see the Lightning team from Games One and Two and not the one that played tonight.