7
0
What if the last 45 days were just an elaborate psyop?
TB-7
TOR-3
Tampa Bay Leads the Series 1-0
Andrei Vasilevskiy allowed three goals on 31 shots for the victory. He was solid, and frankly pretty unchallenged at evens for long stretches of the game.
First Period
1:18 TB Bellemare (1), (Perry)
7:18 TB Cirelli (1), (Hagel)
19:56 TB Kucherov (1), (Sergachev, Killorn)(PP)
Second Period
8:06 TOR O’Reilly (1), (Tavares, Marner)(PP)
13:11 TOR Nylander (1), (Matthews, Marner)(PP)
14:29 TB Point (1), (Kucherov, Cirelli)(PP)
17:54 TB Perry (1), (Colton)(PP)
19:58 TB Point (2), (Perry, Kucherov)(PP)
Third Period
6:59 TB Colton (1), (Perbix, Cole)
8:06 TOR Jarnkrok (1), (Marner, Matthews)
Corey Perry, Brayden Point, and Nikita Kucherov were the game’s three stars.
Wow. I did not expect the Lightning to look that in control at evens and I did not expect Toronto to look that flat. Everything was artificially inflated by the fact Ilya Samsonov looked so horrible that I think he may be burned for the series once the Toronto media finishes crucifying him. But, still, that’s the best the Lightning have looked in forever and Toronto, bizarely, lacked hunger in this game at the start, looked wildly undisciplined in the middle stanza, and was lifeless and clueless in the Third Period. The Lightning have some injury issues to navigate with Hedman out for most of this game with what seemed like an upper body tweak from throwing a hit and Eyssimont and Cernak both sporting possible concussions after potential head shots, but they also are playing with house money with a significant opportunity to psychologically destroy Toronto if they can steal Game Two. And, yes, McCabe and Bunting should be suspended for their head shots in this game. Do I expect the league to do so? No. But they should. McCabe’s had intent, IMO, and Bunting’s was wildly reckless.
Either way, aside from getting healthy, the key for the Lightning is to flush Game One by tomorrow morning and refocus on the opportunity they have in Game Two. Whether you win 7-3 or 700-3, it only counts as one win and the Lightning need three more to finish off Toronto. The Lightning need not look any further than their flat outing in Game One last year to know that a team can come back to win the series after a bad opener, and there are plenty of other examples in the past of the Lightning losing Game One against veteran Bruins teams only to run them out of the rink the rest of the series.
But… man… the opportunity is right there for the taking. Don’t you want to see what the Toronto media will do to the Leafs if they fall down 0-2 at home in the series?
Darren Raddysh was -1 with 2 shots, 5 hits, and 3 blocked shots in 23:37 of IT making up for Hedman and Cernak’s absence.
Box score and extended statistics from NHL.com.
