Tampa Bay Lightning top the Columbus Blue Jackets in a shootout

The Tampa Bay Lightning narrowly top the Columbus Blue Jackets in a shootout by a score of 5-4 after blowing a two-goal lead in the third period.

In addition to the game, Saturday was the Tampa Bay Lightning‘s celebration of the 2003-2004 Stanley Cup Champion team.  Members of the original team were at the game for the ceremony and the current Bolts wore throwback jerseys during the warmups.  One touching video commemorating the cup run later, and it was time to drop the puck.

The first period was a rather strange one for both teams.  The Columbus Blue Jackets scored first off of a loose puck that bounced off of both Victor Hedman and Andrei Vasilevskiy.  This was the result of a botched clear that left the Bolts in a vulnerable position, and the Blue Jackets cashed in.

Not even two minutes later, Brayden Point would even the game off of another opportunistic play.  After a fumble in front of the net, Point came up with the puck and was able to backhand it up and over Blue Jackets netminder Sergei Bobrovsky.

At this point, the scoring in the first period was only halfway over.  Nikita Kucherov would score his 14th of the season shortly after Point evened the game to seemingly give the Bolts a lead to take into the intermission.  The highlight of the goal was Mikhail Sergachev‘s incredible assist.

He got the puck in the left circle and it seemed the perfect opportunity for a shot.  The young defensemen showed awareness beyond his years and managed to thread the puck over to a waiting Kucherov on the other side of the net.  Bobrovsky didn’t even have a chance.

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Unfortunately, the Bolts would fall victim to a botched clear again.  A perfect centering pass to Zach Werenski led to a goal that shouldn’t have been a goal.  The teams would take their tie to the intermission.

The second period was characterized by penalties.  Both teams racked up a good number of penalties and the Bolts cashed in.  Steven Stamkos netted yet another Power Play goal off of a beautiful feed from Nikita Kucherov.  Stamkos added yet another goal to his franchise power play goal record.

Later in the period, Yanni Gourde would get a pass from behind the net and waste no time putting it past Bobrovsky.  This goal extended his goal streak to 3 games and gave Victor Hedman his second assist of the night.

Defense was the name of the game for the Lightning as they held the Blue Jackets to only 6 shots in the second period.  The Bolts doubled their score while keeping the Blue Jackets where they were when the period started.  A 4-2 lead going into the third period is never a bad thing.

The third period was largely quite up until the last 10 minutes.  The Blue Jackets cut the lead of the Bolts in half off of a lucky wraparound.  The puck ended up behind the net and Markus Hännikäinen (good luck pronouncing that) was able to slip the puck past Vasilevskiy from behind.  Vasy was where he should have been to make the save, but he didn’t have the bottom of the goal sealed properly.

Not even two minutes later, the Blue Jackets tied the game.  Once again, the Bolts botched a clear and the Blue Jackets took advantage.  Brandon Dubinsky scored his first of the season, but there weren’t many celebrating inside of Amalie.

Neither team would be able to make anything else happen before the end of the third period.  The Lightning would be playing in their second straight overtime.

Steven Stamkos would take a very inopportune penalty in overtime and set his team up for a 4 on 3 penalty kill.  Luckily, the Bolts were on their toes and were able to keep the game even.  Nothing would get solved in overtime and it would go to a shootout.

First up was Nikita Kucherov.  On reputation, you would assume this was destined for the back of the net.  In an uncommon event, Kucherov missed the net completely and Bobrovsky wasn’t even challenged.  Vasilevskiy was forced to make a save, and save it he did.  Nothing was solved in the first round of the shootout, so on it went.

Brayden Point was next up and he was stopped on the backhand.  Vasilevsky responded appropriately though, as he blocked his opponent too.

The Captain took the next shot and wasted no time putting the puck up and over the blocker of Bobrovsky to finally break the scoreless tie.  The pressure was on Sonny Milano as he had to score to keep the Blue Jackets alive.  Unfortunately for them, Vasilevskiy was ready for Milano and stopped the attempted comeback just short of its goal.

This game was almost a disaster for the Lightning.  They managed to blow a two-goal lead in the third period and took an ill-timed penalty in overtime.  Thankfully, Vasilevsky was at the top of his game and kept his team alive.

Three of the Blue Jackets four goals came off of defensive breakdowns and botched clears by the Bolts.  This was incredibly similar to the way the Bolts played in their overtime loss to the Rangers, which is (and should be) alarming. 

Next: Steven Stamkos, Nikita Kucherov Named October NHL Stars

Something to note, the first two blunders involved Andrej Sustr and as a result, he didn’t even touch the ice in the second period.  This might be a sign of things to come as he hasn’t been playing his best lately.