But in one of its biggest regular-season games in years, Tampa Bay found a way in front of a sold-out crowd at Amalie Arena, moving into first place in the Atlantic Division and giving it a six-point cushion over the Red Wings, who are now sitting tied for eighth in the Eastern Conference with Philadelphia.
Advertisement
The Lightning hadn’t scored more than four goals in a span of 16 games, going back to a 6-5 shootout win over Winnipeg on February 18. “We have to be a real good home ice team here in this stretch”.
Condra’s previous goal came on December 5 in San Jose. The Flyers had two goals in the first period with a 23-3 shot advantage. Brian Boyle, Tyler Johnson and Victor Hedman added two assists apiece. “There’s been some times he hasn’t been in the lineup”.
When you fully digest the reality of how this division lead came to be, it sometimes feels like anything but reality.
Justin Abdelkader and Darren Helm scored for Detroit, which finished 2-and-2 on its four-game road trip.
Okay, so that’s the bad news, The good news is the game between the Lightning and Red Wings was decided in regulation.
All three period-opening goals were important for the Lightning because they swung momentum to the Bolts from the outset and forced the Red Wings to play catchup for the entire game, a role they’re decidedly less comfortable playing because they can’t clamp down defensively.
That might not happen, though, unless they can change their recent road fortunes against Tampa Bay.
“We never gave up the lead, but we never really let them get that close”, Cooper said.
Tampa Bay held a 3-0 lead against the Red Wings, but then surrendered two goals.
“You can’t give up goals early”, Blashill said.
When Steven Stamkos sent a shot in off Jonathan Ericsson 33 seconds into the second period, it spelled the end of Howard’s night, through more fault of his teammates than him.
A portion of the proceeds from all the evening’s activities, including the Red Wings Foundation’s 50/50 raffle, will benefit Make-A-Wish Michigan and go toward granting wishes of children facing life-threatening medical conditions. Detroit hasn’t the same level of success we have come to know over the years but are certainly a team to watch out for if they can sneak in as they have a ton of playoff experience and two snipers in Henrik Zetterberg and Pavel Datsyuk who have Stanley Cup rings. “But we had a couple of days between that we gave the guys off. We rested”. “And when they made it a one-goal lead we extended it pretty (quickly)”. Tampa Bay got an unexpected boost from Condra, who had two goals and a game-high five shots, his first points since December 26 (just eight overall). Erik Condra scored less than 2 minutes in, and Vladislav Namestnikov made it 2-0 before the period was halfway through. “There’s not going to be any knight in shining armor that comes over the fence here and through the door that’s going to get the job done for us”.
NOTES: Anthony Mantha got his first National Hockey League point on Helm’s goal late in the second…. That was said in reference to the game against the Philadelphia Flyers, in which the Detroit Red Wings got severely outperformed in the first period of play.
Advertisement
The period ended with the Lightning up 4-2. 6, Tampa Bay, Kucherov 28 (Johnson, Stamkos), 17:42 (pp).
