TAMPA, Fla. – Hurricane Helene and Hurricane Milton were a pair of relentless storms that had no restitution in the Tampa Bay Area these last couple of weeks as the duo punished southwestern Florida and Tampa Bay, in general.
While the Tampa Bay Lightning skated to a 4-1 win in their home opener against the Vancouver Canucks on Tuesday, the score duplicated the 4-1 win at Carolina on Friday night before the home opener was postponed on Saturday evening vs. the Carolina Hurricanes.
“We were just trying to put out a win and put on a good performance so that the people who were watching, maybe they would have something to cheer about if they were fans,” said Lightning center Brayden Point.
Meanwhile, Lightning coach Jon Cooper lauded the Vancouver Linesmen who came from the British Columbian city as they were given a standing ovation from the Amalie Arena patrons for coming and helping to restore power in the area. They were also shown on the video screen inside Amalie Arena that brought even more cheers from the crowd.
“I normally don’t look up there a ton, but that was a pretty moving moment for me,” said Cooper. “It just shows you that there is a lot of good out there and when people come together and help each other, it makes you feel good and we have been hit with a tough circumstance here the last couple of weeks.”
On the ice, Nikita Kucherov scored his fourth goal of the season at the 3:55 mark of the first period, following his hat-trick in the opening night win in Raleigh. Vancouver made the second period more of a challenge, Point gave Tampa Bay a 2-0 lead just 7:43 into the second period.
The Lightning have looked like a team that has found its chemistry in camp as their connectivity has moved forward even this early in a season.
“Since we went to Carolina for that week, I think coming home and seeing a lot of the devastation and what has happened in our city — It’s kind of brought everybody together and it has translated to the ice,” Cooper noted.
After Kucherov controlled a loose puck in the Vancouver zone, he maintained his position on the left side of the ice. Then, the puck moved to Darren Raddysh on the right side, where he sent the puck back into the left circle where Kucherov scored for the 1-0 lead.
Point was credited with an assist on the score and he added his second goal of the season when he took the puck to the right circle via a pass from Jake Guentzel, who spent last season in both Carolina and Pittsburgh. He signed a seven-year deal with Tampa Bay in the offseason.
“He has an elite IQ, so he can think with the best of the players out there,” explained Cooper. “He’s really calm like there is really not a lot of stress to his game. When he has the brain he has, he can play with those guys and I think he is going to get better as time goes on.”
Tampa Bay went up 3-0 just 39 seconds into the third period when Branden Hagel found Anthony Cirelli, who was behind Vancouver defenseman Tyler Myers in the doorstep of the left side of the crease.
Hagel added an empty-netter late in the third to answer Canucks forward Conor Garland’s power play goal at 4:14 into the third period.
“The power play didn’t score tonight,” said Cooper. “We have to work on it somehow and we haven’t had a ton of exhibition games to do that so everybody got some looks.”
Goalie Andrei Vasilevskiy stopped 26 of 27 Canucks shots as he was able to push the Lightning through a tough second period where Tampa Bay had a tough time with turnovers.
