Tampa Bay Lightning

We continue our Prospect of the Week award, an honor (virtually) given to one Tampa Bay Lightning prospect for their recent contributions on and off the ice.

The Prospect of the Week for February 12 is … Alex Killorn, C/W, Tampa Bay (NHL – USA)

More than five years after his draft day, Alex Killorn made his NHL debut for the Tampa Bay Lightning at the world’s most famous arena.

Killorn, a third round pick of the Bolts in 2009, had an assist on Sunday in the Lightning’s 5-1 loss to the Rangers at Madison Square Garden. Killorn started on the third line, but worked his way up to a scoring line with Vincent Lecavalier and Teddy Purcell by game’s end. He brought grit on the forecheck and his willingness to play in front of the net resulted in an assist.

The Lightning brought Killorn to the big club to add size and skill to the Bolts’ third line. Dana Tyrell was waived and assigned to AHL Syracuse.

For the second time in two days, the Tampa Bay Lightning recalled one of their top prospects from the AHL’s Syracuse Crunch.

On Sunday, the Bolts announced that center/winger Alex Killorn would join the NHL club for his NHL debut against the New York Rangers. Killorn had an assist and played well in a 5-1 loss to the Rangers.

On Monday, the NHL club put forward Ryan Malone on injured reserve and called-up second year pro Richard Panik. The Slovakian winger is expected to make his NHL debut at home against the Montreal Canadiens on Tuesday.

Panik is second on the Crunch in goals with 21 and fourth in points with 35 in 43 games. His plus-19 rating is tied for second on the club and third in the league. He sits fourth in the AHL in goals.

He is a logical replacement for Malone, who plays a power forward role with the big club. Panik is a skill forward in a power forward’s body and exhibits a power forward’s mentality in traffic. While listed at 6-1, his strength is impressive as players frequently bounce off him when trying to make a hit. He’s not shy about dropping the gloves and he’s already blown last year’s penalty minute total of 62 out of the water (79).

Suddenly, the entire organization is circling the drain.

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NYR-5

Mathiru Garon allowed 3 goals on 19 shots for the loss before being pulled for Anders Lindback who allowed 2 on 13 the rest of the way. Garon's played like hot garbage the past few starts he's had, and the third goal he allowed was horribly soft.

First Period
00:31 NYR Hagelin (2), (Nash, Girardi)
15:13 NYR Callahan (3), (unassisted)

Second Period
09:58 NYR Hagelin (3), (Staal)
14:42 TB Lecavalier (5), (Hedman, Killorn)

Third Period
12:22 NYR Asham (1), (McDonagh)
19:51 NYR Nash (3), (Hagelin, Girardi)

It's an embarassing, frustrating time to be a fan of the Lightning organization, as both Tampa Bay and Syracuse got shelled tonight and had to pull their goaltenders mid stream en route to being thumped. The symptoms are similar. Stupid turnovers. Uneven effort. Goaltending that can't seem to make big stops when they're needed to erase mistakes. It's hard not to feel disgusted right now.

Alex Killorn had 1 assist and 2 penalty minutes in his NHL debut. He also had 2 shots on goal in 13:17 of ice time, earning a promotion to the Lecavalier line. It was a pretty good debut after some early shifts where he looked a little wide eyed about the pace of the game. I just wish the result for the team had been better for his first game.

Pierre-Cedric Labrie had 1 hit in 6:45. I'm not seeing a lot of positives in his shifts. He's second to a lot of pucks, and not really landing any hits in the process.

Cory Conacher was -1 with 3 shots and 1 hit in 20:03. The fact the Lightning have to play a rookie, even one as good as Conacher, 20+ minutes to try to spark offense is an awfully bad omen.

Box score and extended statistics from NHL.com.

It was a bad call.

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Anders Lindback allowed 4 goals on 27 shots for the loss. He was victimized statistically by the two 5-on-3's at the end of the game. Lindback is now two decisions away from graduating from prospect status on the site.

First Period
NO SCORING

Second Period
03:28 NJD Henrique (3), (Volchenkov, Elias)
13:19 TB Thompson (2), (St. Louis)

Third Period
15:02 NJD Greene (2), (Clarkson, Elias)(PP)
15:16 NJD Elias (3), (Kovalchuk, Greene)(PP)
17:45 TB Carle (2), (St. Louis, Stamkos)

It's very frustrating to have a very tight game essentially yanked out from under you the way the game tonight was by the referees. The high sticking call late in the game on Adam Hall was flat out wrong on two levels. First, Hall was in the process of trying to shoot the puck away on the PK, and last I checked the follow through when shooting a puck is specifically legislated not to be a high-sticking infraction. Second, and just as importantly, Zajac tripped Hall on the play, causing Hall to spin and fall to the ice as he was making the clearing attempt, with the stick primarily hitting Zajac's visor. Guy Boucher was absolutely right. It was a bad call. Unfortunately expressing that nugget of truth to the refs came with the price tag of the unsportsmanlike minor that made things go from bad to worse.

So the Lightning now meet adversity in the form of a 3-game losing streak smack in the middle of a tough road trip. This is where you'd hope Lindback or Garon could step up and be a streak stopper.

Cory Conacher was -1 with 1 shot in 15:10.

Box score and extended statistics from NHL.com.

Still trying to figure out how to win a close, tight checking game.

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Anders Lindback allowed 2 goals on 24 shots for the loss.

First Period
NO SCORING

Second Period
04:25 PHI Sestito (1), (Voracek, Schenn)

Third Period
09:30 TB Pouliot (3), (Purcell, Pyatt)
11:11 PHI Sestito (2), (Talbot, Fedotenko)

The Lightning have their first losing streak of the season now as they attempt to break the code on how to win a close, tight checking game. My 2 cents: the power play has to be better in games like this.

Cory Conacher had 4 shots and 1 hit in 16:35.

Box score and extended statistics from NHL.com.