Latest / Backchecking the Bolts / Lightning Fall 4–2 to Hurricanes Tampa Bay Lightning vs Carolina Recap & Kraken Game Preview
Transcript
- Jason Linkes: Coming up on back checking the bolts. We're going to break down Tampa's four two loss to the Carolina Hurricanes. We're going to tell you what went wrong, where the breakdowns happen and what the bolts need to do moving forward. Then we're going to turn the page. We're going to take a look at the upcoming game against Seattle and the upcoming four game road trip. Can the bolts bounce back, tighten things up a little bit defensively and can their offense get rolling again? We'll dive into some key matchups and a lot more coming up next on back checking the bolts. Welcome to Back Checking the Bolts. Back Checking the Bolts is your cup of coffee to get you the latest on the Tampa Bay Lightning. Join host Jason Linkus and the managing editor of Raw Charge, Justin Godfrey, as they break down the Lightning's most recent games and go beyond the highlights, telling you what the box scores didn't. It's time to drop the puck. Welcome to back checking the bolts. Hi, I'm your host, Jason. Lincoln's and as always, I'm joined by the managing editor of raw charge. is Justin Godfrey. You can see Justin every single day on raw charge at www.rawcharge.com Justin. Let's get your instant reaction to the four to Carolina loss. know, it's a process, Jay. How does the light near still working through it? I thought there were areas where they skated pretty well with Carolina, mostly in the second period. They got off to a slow start again. against Carolina. mean, this is the third game in a row they've been down multiple goals to Carolina. At least they, you know, limited it to just two this time as opposed to the normal three. Lightning came back, you know, they tied up two-two. And then I think Carolina just did a really good job of imposing their style of game on it from that point on. After the, you know, the second lightning goal scored by Charles Edward Distu, which was a really nice two-on-one. mean, Britain Point made a hell of a pass across and then Distu finished it off. After that point, Carolina got back into their defensive shape, clogged up the neutral zone. Pretty much everything that the Lightning tried to do, Carolina had an answer for it and really limited Tampa's chances in the third period. They only ended up with two shots on goal. They did have three high danger chances, which is, don't see that too often where you have more chances than you have shots on net. Just think it's, they're still working through this. It's going to be a process. did. have some good moments against a really good team. Let's not forget that. You know, it's not like Carolina's looking for a draft pick right now. They are a top Eastern conference. So I really, I really think there's enough glimmer of glimmers of hope there that it looks like the lady are pulling themselves out of this bunk right now. They can keep building on what they did well in the Pacific Northwest. can now pick up some wins. want to talk about the first goal in particular. was a breakdown on a couple of sorts. First of all, You have the breakaway, which was stopped. And then it was, there was a delayed penalty against Victor Hedman. Everybody on the lightning side and even a couple Carolina hurricanes stopped dead in their tracks. After the game, was there anything said about that play? really. I don't even think it came up in the press conference. This is what happens when you're a team that's struggling, right? It's these little moments where a brief little inattention to detail ends up in the back of your net. So like you said, know, sweatshirt comes in on the breakaway. Headman hooks him or slashes him. The shot gets on net. It looked like Headman touched the puck, kind of sent it back to the blue line. But again, you know, the rule isn't touching the puck anymore. It's control. So even if he did, you know, it could have been in the ref's opinion that the light, he didn't control the puck. He may have just touched it. Everyone stopped skating, even Sveshnikov stopped for a little bit. I think he had his hands up in the air. I think the only one who didn't really stop was Aho who gathers the puck and then feeds it over. Vasileski almost makes a save, now you're, know, Celesta in minute into the game and you're down one nothing against this team. And I think they were kind of chasing it a little bit in the first period there. You got to know that Carolina is going to come out strong. And so you got to be on your game and you know, getting just that little mental breakdown a little bit. It's one nothing, it's back of the net and now you're chasing it again. So yeah, those kinds of little errors are still creeping into their game and that's the stuff they got to get out. It's stuff you didn't see during the winning streak. So if they get back to that, get back to the attention to detail. I think things are going to be okay. had mentioned that in the previous matchups, Carolina had jumped out to three nothing leads and in each matchup Tampa erased that deficit. This matchup was no different except there was a two nothing lead. And then the second period, the bolts, I think got some speed back in their game. Yanni Gord sort of had that Mark Recky-esque shot down the right wing side and then a really nice play from pointed to Stu for the goal to make it two to two. Even though the shots were really heavily favoring Carolina, the back half of that game, the bolts did create some offense. just didn't register on the statistics. I think part of it was that that Gord line was playing pretty well as one of the few lines that was skating with Carolina. So to get you out and see Yachty get rewarded with a goal made, like you said, was kind of that Mark Recky off the, off the offside wing coming down. Little hesitation shot. think it may have nicked off of the defender a little bit and it beats Freddie Anderson on the glove side. And then it's right back. mean, was a minute 21 later that Dastous scored on that two on one where points saucers a Passover to the far post and Dastous stuffs it in. And was really good to see Dastous score. think it's been something like early December since he scored last. And he has been out a little bit, but you know, kind of get him re-engaged, get him scoring again. It was really nice to see. They were really skating really well for a little bit there. I think maybe something that shook up the lightning a little bit is Zemges Gurgensons kind of took a block to shot up high towards the end of the second period, missed the rest of the game. So that's kind of one of those little key pieces. He's out now the light near shuffling their lines a little bit. Probably their most effective checking line is, you know, mixed up. got to, I think they moved your train back up there, but yeah, it kind of shook them up a little bit. And then Carolina got in, got into their defensive form and it just kind of shut them down. In the third period, Carolina threw a lot of shots on net, but the one that eventually found its way to hit the twine was an innocent shot that I think hit headman on the way in, or at least went through his legs. Tell us a little bit about that game winning goal. Yeah. It's one of those good lightning kind of turn it over in there in the offensive zone. Carolina comes down and I thought lightning had pretty good, you know, they had pretty good coverage in the defensive zone. He gets rimmed up around the boards from behind the net and Martin look, yeah, he just kind of throws it towards the net. There is a Carolina plater on the far side. ⁓ I think it was Jordan stall. So honestly, think it was more of a pass and a shot. Headman's a glance, you know, he's kind of skating in front of Vasilevsky to, to pick up that man. And I think it hits just there's one angle on the overhead where just the angle that the puck goes into the net. You could tell it wasn't directly off the stick. So again, that's another thing that happens on these kind of. slumps is just the puck bounces don't go your way. That being said, I think the light, you can pull something from that is just when you're in a slump and just throw the puck towards the net. It's sometimes it's going to be an ugly dirty goal. Yeah. That dirty goal, the gritty goal, the unlucky goal for the other team is just sometimes you just got to throw it at net. And I think the lightning get into these little funks where they want to score the perfect goal. You know, it's, want to do that back door pass, the tic tac toe pass. And they'll pass up opportunities from the slot from inside the circles, good shooting chances. And sometimes it's just gotta be like, man, just shoot it. Carolina gets a lot of credit for that and a lot of flack that, you know, people call them the Corsi Kings of the NHL because they'll shoot from anywhere. ⁓ but they're also part of that is that they're in, in position. I mean, you gotta be defensively responsible when you're just flinging the punch from anywhere. Cause if it gets blocked, you still got to be able to get back and in shape. So that's something. I don't think Carolina gets enough credit for is the fact that yes, they shoot it from everywhere, but their players are always in position. So if something goes wrong, they can cover it. And I'd like to see the lightning kind of draw a little bit out of that. Don't, don't look for the perfect shot. I think anyone who's ever listened to a radio broadcast with philosophy, you know, there's a man's going to have a coronary one day for brain point passing up shots from the point. Yeah. You can always tell he's upset when he calls David Michigan David. He's just David, David, they have to show. I don't understand this. You know, I think lightning fans have been listening to that for 30 years now. You know, it's just kind of one of those things that sometimes you can shoot your way out of a slump and just, you know, start firing. Just make sure you're clearing that first line of defense. That is kind of the, you know, an issue with the lightning from time to time when they shoot from the blue line or from deep. You know, that forward that's out pressing blocks a shot. Now it's a breakaway the other way. So. You got to be responsible when you do it, but yeah, just don't look for the perfect opportunity. Just kind of just get in on that sometimes get to make the other goalie and start moving around and you'll find that your chances will start developing. one of the things when you go on Twitter, you search fan message boards. A lot of people are all over the play of Victor Hedman. Now we know Hedman was hurt for 30 ish games. He just got back in the lineup when the stadium series happened in February. Is Headman hurt in your opinion still or is he just in a little bit of a slump? It's tough. I don't know if he's a hundred percent. He's, he's saying he's feeling better than he has in a while. It's just always kind of been the way Headman's played. He's not, he's a big guy, but he's not a physical guy. ⁓ he relies a lot on his positioning, his stick work, his reach and Sometimes when you're a player like that and you get beat or you're, you're a slight step behind, it just looks really bad. And that's, I think it's kind of optical right now. The numbers aren't having been favorable to him. He is struggling this year. I've like, I will admit it. I'm a big headman fan. I've defended him as much as I can, but he's just having a bad year. And think part of it is right now, he's not sure what his role is on the team. Uh, he is the captain, but he's also not the best defenseman on the team anymore. He's just not, mean, and. age is a part of it. They have him signed for another three years after. So it's going to be interesting to see how Cooper uses him. Cooper is never in a waiver in his trust of Victor Hedman. He's going to have him out there for big moments. And I just think maybe he's at that stage where he has to adjust how he plays the game. He is what he is right now. He's a six foot six defenseman who probably one of the smartest players on the ice. He knows his angles. He knows his positioning, but I think he's just kind of struggling right now to put it all together. That being said, Right now it's more or less get him to the playoffs and then see what happens. I think he still has that innate talent, that ability to make the right plays. And when things slow down a little bit in the playoffs, I he's going be a lot more effective. so it's something to keep an eye on moving forward. And again, he's on the ice a lot. So I think that's why he draws a lot of attention on the social media. He's just out there a lot and that's going to happen. It's kind of like Kucherov and his giveaways. If the Lightning are struggling, they're going to... A lot of fans are going to look towards the top players and that's kind of always been a headman trademark is that when he's on, he shuts down plays before they even happen. So you don't notice those things. You know, he shuts somebody off at the blue line or he pins them against the board and the play never develops. That's something to look for when you're, when you're watching him play. Let's just look to see how many goals he shuts down before they happen. Justin, other than the Gergensen's injury, we found out that before the game, Declan Carlisle is going to be out four to five weeks. Steve Santini was sent down. Now he sent right. He's called right back up again. How are the lightning going to reshuffle the defense with that injury? Yeah. Uh, was kind of a busy little weekend for Santini. He gets sent down, I think on Thursday, he plays in Syracuse Friday and he's right back in Tampa on Saturday. He's probably going to be your seventh defenseman until Amelia Lilliburg comes back, which hopefully should be soon. Uh, we kind of wrote about it last night when we were talking about the, the Harlow injury. For the lightning, at least they have their top four back. So they can kind of shuffle the decks a little bit on, on that bottom pairing. But yeah, I think Santini is up. As as Lil Bird gets cleared, Santini is probably back with Syracuse right now. It was kind of hard. I went back to that Detroit game to watch the last few shifts from Carlisle and you really don't see anything happen. ⁓ So it's kind of a shame. I don't know if it's one of these away from contact kind of injuries where you tweak something and, for him to get hurt. It's kind of a raw deal for him. He was scheduled to be in a group six free agent, unrestricted free agent this summer. for those who aren't aware of what that is, is basically a player that has three years of professional experience. So either at AAHL or some of the European league levels, but doesn't have a minimum of 80 games played at the NHL. If you're over 25, you can be basically an unrestricted free agent. So that's what he was scheduled to be. He was playing pretty well. He's gotten into 38 games with the lightning this year and a strong, steady defenseman, good depth guy. Now he's got an injury to rehab. It's probably going to take him out the rest of the year. Could, could hurt his paycheck a little bit as far as the free agent market. You know, if you're like a lightning fan who like him, it could be a good sign because it could keep him in the organization for another year. That, that defensive death is getting tested again. I think Santini is up until like I said, a little bit just healthy and then as long as nobody else gets hurt. On the defensive side, you'll probably see a little bit of a great to do as your seventh defenseman rotating in and out of the lineup. Well, Justin, you'd mentioned the Detroit game in the Detroit game. Nikita Kucherov had a couple points and was able to get to 1100 in his career. And that brings us to the nurture marketing trivia question of the day. Now, for those of you are keeping score at home. Nurture Marketing is sponsoring a Nikita Kucherov jersey. So one lucky fan of the podcast. If you email us at back checking the bolts at yahoo.com with the correct answer, you register for that Nikita Kucherov jersey that'll be given away at the end of March. You can register each show with each correct answer. Justin today's question with Nikita Kucherov having 1100 points. Amongst active NHL players who are in the top 10. Wow. I got to come up with nine names on a Sunday morning. 10, 10. It's Kutroff is 11. He's 11? He's not even... Top 10 in active points. Yep. And some of these you're going to get fast. All right. So let's, let's go with, um, Crosby and Ovechkin. Crosby number one with 1746. Ovechkin number two, 1674. I'm going to throw, ⁓ Eddie Malkin up there as well. Number three, 1393. Here go. In order. This is where it's going to get fun boys and gals. ⁓ how about, how about our captain, dear captain, Steve, his stamp coast. Does he make the cut? He is number six at 1241. ⁓ Let's see. So we're looking at more than a thousand points. Active players. than 1100. 1100. Yeah. So these guys that just hit it. Let's see. I don't think Matthews has gotten there. McDavid hasn't gotten there yet, has he? Yes, he has. 1193 already. Wow. That's crazy, man. He is going to, he's going to push that 2000 point threshold if he stays. Unless he just walks off into the water after his 17th losing season in Edmonton or something like that. It becomes a hermit living in the cabin somewhere. All right. Let's see. Who else is always up there? I don't think McKiddens played enough to get to 1100. He has. Wow. 1124. All right. So I don't mean if I knocked off that one. You need numbers four, five, eight and nine. Four, five, eight and nine. All right. So if McKinnon's made it, let's see, Dry Cytle? Who is? Leon, Leon Dry Cytle. Dry Cytle was 12th, 1052. All right. So next year. Where am I thinking? East coast, West coast, mix, central? Well, it's a little bit of a mix. Any goaltenders out on the list? No, Tom Barrasso was a little bit short. All right. Well, a little short there, but think of the last trivia question that we did the other day. Oh God. Yeah. But also one player just became the LA Kings all time point score passing Marcel Dion. Yes. Number five, 1308. What a career, man. He's just been a solid player. I don't think he gets enough love for what he's done. All right. So that's all right. Uh, next one was it West coast or East coast? Uh, number four is, what about Patty Kane? That's number four right there. That's the one I thought I was surprised you didn't get a little earlier. 1381. Whatever. He's Patrick Kane. He is 12 points behind if getting Malkin for thirds. So now you have eight and nine. They are both in the Atlantic division. They both play in Canada right now. Yes. That was the one that surprised me. did not expect that 11 56 solid player dudes just goes out, does what he does. I think he loves playing in Ottawa. Uh, know his name. Yeah. And like, I don't think he wants to leave. I think he's happy to just kind of keep playing up there. Matthew's Matthew's hasn't gotten to 1100. No number eight. I'll give you a clue. You'll get this Islanders and Toronto. ⁓ Johnny Tavares, John Tavares, 1168. So for everybody out there, just give me one name of those top 10 email with the back checking the bolts at Yahoo.com for your entry to the nurture marketing, Nikita Kucherov Jersey. We appreciate nurture marketing, helping us out with the trivia and Justin pretty good job there, bud. Yeah. You know, the brain cells connect every once in a while, even early in the morning. So just trying to think, was like, whose rookie year is, is around Stamco. said, that should, that should give him pretty close to 1100 points. Of all the names on there, I did not expect Claude Giroux. I have to admit, I thought he would be maybe in the twenties. I didn't realize he had made it over a thousand points. He's just like steady. Like I don't think he's ever had a huge year, but it's just, you know, what is it in the 80, 90 point guy almost every year. He's got that longevity with it and it's quality. Yeah. That's another thing. Yeah. You can play 79 82 games. Um, you know, top six minutes here, you're going to put the points up. Justin, the bolts now face a four game road trip. They go to Seattle on Tuesday night. It's a TNT game. If you're watching from home, it's 10 o'clock on Thursday. They're at Vancouver. Another 10 o'clock start on Saturday against Edmonton at 10 and Sunday, they go back to back. at Calgary before they eventually return home on that following Tuesday for a game against the wild. So first of all, you look at the schedule, you have that back to back. You have to imagine Johansson's getting the start against Calgary. Correct? Yeah, that's probably where I'd peg him in as far as, you know, if he's, you know, he is going to get a start. So that's where I would put him in as well. Yeah. I think this is one of those road trips where you don't want to start counting your points before you go out there, but. I think the lightning need to pick up. think we talked about this a little bit before and before we started recording, you're looking at a road trip where they need to pick up five or six points on this. And you look out all of those teams, I would say, except Calgary and Vancouver, well, Calgary and Vancouver are two that you circle right away as these guys are in the top traffic conversation. They should be wins, but it's the NHL. can't guarantee anything. Edmonton is kind of scuffling right now. So you say, Hey, maybe you catch them on a down period. Seattle's going to give them some issues. I think Seattle's probably of the four teams going to be one of the tougher matchups, just because of the style that they play here. Looking at, it's going to be a tough road trip, you know, anytime you're playing out on out West Pacific Northwest, it's really tough. Well, let's take a look at some of those teams. They're going to be facing in the standings in the Western conference. Colorado is far and above everybody. have 97 points. They lead the central, but they're challenged in the central by Dallas with 94, Minnesota with 88 in the Pacific. You can put everyone on the Plinko board. It changes day to day. Right now it's the Vegas golden Knights with 76 and first the ducks with 75 points and second Edmonton's and third was 73 and the sharks all of a sudden with a couple wins in a row. They are in the second wild card spot. The top wild card spot is the Utah mammoth with 74. The Seattle crack and who the bolts will see first on this road trip. One point out of a wild card with 69 points. Justin, I see this as a contrast of styles. Seattle is going to play a little bit like Carolina. They're going to clog up the neutral zone. They're going to try to slow the game down. The bolts want to speed it up. What else do you see with this matchup that could be a little bit troubling for Tampa? Yeah. Um, like I said, I'll get them up in the neutral zone there. think. Seattle's got a very opportunistic offense. They're not going to be a high flying, high scoring team, but they are going to, you know, take advantage of the chances that they do get. you kind of want to see the lightning attack that neutral zone with speed, have the clean breakouts and push Seattle back, you know, with their puck carriers like Point, Kutrow bringing the puck in. And just kind of driving those defenders back. Maybe if that doesn't work early, maybe do get into a dump and chase kind of game. I the Lightning get away from that from time to time and they don't, they aren't as strong on the forecheck as they could, as they could be. So if the natural zone is clogged up, sometimes you got to take what the other team gives you, you know, just dump it in, go down, chase after that puck and get set up that way. If the Lightning can break out, I think they have a chance against Seattle. get that early lead, kind of go from there. So that's what we're looking for. Just clean puck exits out of the zone, either carrying it up or those quick passes that get you through the neutral zone. this game becomes a special teams contest, you have to like Tampa there. Seattle's penalty kill is one of the worst in the league. Tampa's power play is always one of the most dangerous out there. So I would take a look at that. Justin, we don't get to see the Seattle cracking a whole lot. The Bolts haven't played them yet this year. We're going to be playing them on Tuesday at 10 o'clock. Seattle's traveling back to Tampa later this month. They have some interesting players, Matty Beniers, Jordan McCann, Jordan Eberle. We expect to see Joey DeCord in net. Tell everyone a little bit about the Seattle Kraken. Yeah, they had themselves kind of an interesting deadline. I think a lot of folks thought they may be sellers. Then they announced that they were going to hold on to Eberle and went out and got Bobby McCann from Toronto kind of the big splash for them to help them with their offense. It really is kind of a team offense. If you look at their stats, you know, they don't have anybody who's averaging even a point of game right now. I Everly is leading them with about 47 points. It's got 20 goals, but they do kind of spread it out. So they have five or six players that are in double digits with goals. They're not going to give you really a break. They're going to roll their lines out there. They're all going to be competitive and in your face. So the light you're going to have to. Just make sure they just take care of the little things. Don't let them get behind them. Don't let them build up a lead and just kind of grind out a win. think it's going to be one of those kind of grinding type games. There's not going to be a lot of space out there. going be a tight tech checking games. They're just going have to outwork them basically. We're going to be talking about the Curtis Douglas revenge game in our next podcast, which will drop on Wednesday, but it's this time of year, Justin, when you start seeing college free agents out there and the lightning have a couple. that they want to take a look at. Give us an update on the college free agents. So as these conference tournaments wind down and I believe today, later today is the selections Sunday for the frozen for NCAA tournament. You're going to find out which teams seasons are done, which ones are still going on. So the lightning do have some players in at the NCAA level, some of their prospects playing that could turn pro now. One that we're kind of keeping an eye on. It's kind of a bit of a surprise. Boston university had Not a great year this year. They're probably not going to make the tournament honestly. So you're going to be looking at some of their players turning pro. And one we've been keeping an eye on Jack Harvey, the Lightning drafted him back in 2023. He's a forward. He just completed, I believe his third season. Yep. This third season in Boston university. He's a forward with some playmaking skills at this point. Is he done with his college careers? Is time for him to take that next step? He did come in, I believe 21st in our top 2,525 countdowns. So he's one of these guys that has a little bit of skill. He can add some offensive flair to the organization. So he has, had to sign his entry level deal. So it could be one of these where he signs it in the next week or so, then joins the crunch on a tryout contract so that that contract doesn't kick it until next year, that professional contract. So kind of keep an eye out for that. There are other free agents that weren't drafted. We haven't. That's probably something we're going to take a look at over at raw charge this week. The Lightning had dipped into that pool in the past. Like, like we mentioned Declan Carlisle earlier, he was a college free agent signing, not drafted during his draft years. Lightning pick him up with their, ⁓ kind of lack of draft picks, higher end draft picks. It's been a source of talent for them lately. So keep an eye out. I wouldn't be surprised if the Lightning make a signing or two and then bring in some of their prospects like Harvey to start them on their professional career. Kind of start working their way up to the lightning. yeah, something to keep an eye on while you're downing your coffee or your energy drinks to get ready for these late night games. there's nothing like staying up till one in the morning and then having to get up for work because of some West coast hockey. Justin, tell us what's going on at Raw Charge. Yeah. Like I said, I'm going to be looking at some of those college free agents, breaking down some of the play may take a look at some special teams. Thought the penalty kill has started to get back over the last two games, seeing them. ⁓ play a little better. So we may take a deeper look into that to see what they're doing. Right. And yeah, just keeping you up to date with all the moves, everything that's coming and going with the Lightning, far as their roster, keep an eye on the crunch. Connor Gicke did go back down to Syracuse, had an assist in their shootout loss to Laval. So they're still chasing that first place spot. But yeah, just keep you up to date on everything happening in the good old hockey world. That is today's podcast for back checking the bolts. We're going to be back with you on Wednesday. We're going to drop the next pod. and recap the lightning cracking game on Tuesday night for the managing editor of raw charge. He is Justin Godfrey. You can see him at www.rawcharge.com. I am Jason link us. We ask you to please like and subscribe to back checking the bolts on our YouTube channel or wherever you get your podcasts. Thanks for joining us. Have a great weekend, everybody. And go bolts. Thank you for listening to back checking the bolts. are free and available on all platforms, including Apple, Spotify, I heart radio, Amazon, YouTube, and Deezer. If you enjoyed it, please be sure to subscribe and leave a review. You can follow Justin on blue sky at raw charge.com. You can follow the show on X at Tampa underscore bolts underscore pod and on Facebook, Instagram and YouTube at back checking the bolts. If you're interested in advertising on the show or partnering with us, You can find more information in the show notes or email Jason at backcheckingthebolts at yahoo.com.