Flat Lightning completely outworked in opener.
PIT-6
TB-2
Andrei Vasilevskiy allowed three goals on 32 shots for the loss. He had a puckhandling gaffe to start the Second Period that proved even he wasn’t immune to the ridiculousness of the night.
First Period
NO SCORING
Second Period
0:12 PIT Heinen (1), (Carter)
4:11 PIT Boyle (1), (Lafferty, O’Connor)
Third Period
11:32 PIT Simon (1), (Letang, McGinn)
14:23 TB Cirelli (1), (Hedman, Stamkos)
14:53 PIT Blueger (1), (unassisted)(EN)
16:49 TB Killorn (1), (Stamkos, Cirelli)
17:35 PIT Rodrigues (1), (Marino)(EN)
18:11 PIT Rust (1), (unassisted)(EN)
Everything about that performance was unacceptable, to the point that it’s not worth dissecting. The gauntlet gets laid for game two: was tonight a case of poor energy on a banner raising night, or is this edition of the Lightning as soft and low energy as they seemed out of the gate?
Taylor Raddysh was -2 with 1 blocked shot in 10:27. Thought he looked like a deer in headlights at times in his NHL debut, and things got worse when Cooper broke up the fourth line to move Maroon up with Perry. I kind of expect Katchouk to go next time out, but it may be Joseph instead of Raddysh who sits.
Box score and extended statistics from NHL.com.