With the Lightning down two goals in the third period against the best team in the NHL, they found a way to rally back and steal a point in Nashville last night.
The Predators are now 22-3-1 at home (the best home record in the NHL). Coach Jon Cooper said it best, “Arguably the hardest place to play if you’re going record-wise in the league against the team with the most points in the league, you’re down 2-0 and you eek a point out of it. Can’t be displeased with that.”
The Predators James Neal beat Andrei Vasilevskiy, five-hole, with just 32.4 seconds left in overtime to give Nashville a 3-2 win and stifle the Bolts furious comeback.
Tampa Bay remains atop the Atlantic Division and the Eastern Conference with the well earned point, but weren’t satisfied leaving Bridgestone Arena without two points.
“We come in here saying, ‘It’s a good test for us,’ but we’ve got to start believing this is a test for the other team, too. We’re a good team. We’re where we are at in the standings for a reason. We’ve got to start proving that. We’re definitely a confident bunch. But sometimes you can’t be satisfied with one. ” said captain Steven Stamkos.
In the toughest month of the season where they will face 12 Western Conference teams, the Bolts have done well, earning six out of ten points so far.
Rookie goalie Andrei Vasilevskiy sparkled in net stopping 26 shots including this highlight reel save on Nashville’s Mike Ribeiro:
Predators Vezina worthy goalie Pekka Rinne was outstanding between the pipes shutting down the high flying Bolts for two periods.
After Brett Connolly scored his tenth of the season at 1:20 of the third period, Nikita Kucherov netted his fourth goal in four games at 7:50 to tie the contest. The Lightning had a chance to win late in regulation, but their anemic power play misfired again.
In the overtime Tampa Bay dominated play until Neal got loose and beat Vasilevskiy.
“We almost could have won that thing in regulation, but it went to overtime and they made one more play than we did,” Cooper said.
The Bolts outshot the Preds 32-29 and improved to 1-15-2 when trailing after two periods.
Nikita Nesterov (healthy), Cedric Paquette (upper body injury), Radko Gudas (knee surgery) and Matt Carle (abdominal surgery) were the scratches. Paquette was injured during the morning skate and is day-to-day.
The Lightning will host the St. Louis Blues Thursday night.
(Feature Photograph/Getty Images)
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