TAMPA, Fla. — Well, that was entertaining. And maybe a little scary.
The Lightning played what might have been their best 20 minutes of hockey all season in the first period on Monday night and still managed to lose a game 5-3.
That’s how hot the Bruins are. And that’s how far the Lightning need to go.
Boston already had a sizable lead on the Lightning in the Atlantic Division coming into the game, and the Bruins widened the gap to an emphatic 11 points through the season’s first 19 games.
“I think everything elevates when these two teams play each other,” Lightning coach Jon Cooper said Monday morning. “It is a little bit of a measuring stick — even if guys don’t want to admit it — it is. There’s pride in the game. Who can stick their nose a little bit higher after this one?”
The good news is it’s still ridiculously early. And regular-season results in November are not necessarily a precursor to what you’ll see once spring arrives.
In the previous five years, the Bruins and Lightning had gone 8-8 against each other in the regular season. But all that really matters is the Lightning went 8-2 against Boston in two postseason showdowns. In other words, there’s plenty of time and hope for better results to come.
So what went wrong for Tampa Bay on Monday, and what do the Lightning need to correct?
You could make the argument that the Lightning took too many penalties. You could also say Tampa Bay left too many scoring opportunities on the ice in the first period.
But, mostly, you should say Boston was tighter, smarter and controlled the real estate in front of the Tampa Bay net. Other than their first goal, the Bruins did most of their damage within a few feet of the goalie crease.
It certainly didn’t look like it was going in that direction when the game began. The Lightning were in complete control from the opening puck drop. They spent almost all of the first eight minutes in the offensive zone, firing the game’s first nine shots on goal.
They finally broke through with 11:03 remaining when Alex Killorn won a puck battle with Connor Clifton in the corner and sent a pass to Steven Stamkos behind the net. Stamkos quickly flipped the puck to Nick Paul in front of the net, and he drove it into the top corner of the goal.
Yet, all that early dominance meant nothing just a short time later.
The Bruins tied the score late in the first period when Charlie McAvoy sent a long, cross-ice pass through the neutral zone and a wide-open David Krejci blasted a slap shot past Andrei Vasilevskiy.
Then, early in the second period, a Pierre-Edouard Bellemare slashing penalty led to a Nick Foligno power-play goal off a rebound and, 31 seconds later, the Bruins scored again.
Boston eventually expanded the lead to 5-1 before the Lightning fought back in the third period with Rudolfs Balcers’ first goal since being acquired from Florida and a second goal from Paul.
