George Richards, FHN Publisher
The Tampa Bay Lightning heard the narrative about how it has not been, well, great at home in the playoffs lately going into Game 2 against the visiting Montreal Canadiens.
The Lightning had lost 10 of its past 12 home postseason games going into Tuesday.
The Panthers, certainly, handed the Lightning a lot of those losses.
On Tuesday, however, J.J. Moser brought joy back to Tampa Bay.
Moser scored at 12:48 of overtime off a shot from the right circle for a 3-2 win to even up the first-round series with Game 3 in Montreal on Friday.
Before Moser scored, the Lightning were winless in its previous seven OT playoff games.
Now, the Lightning has life once more.
Call Tuesday a ‘must-win’ if you will, but it felt like the Lightning really needed a must-win game.
The series is now tied going back to Quebec.
“Somebody has to be the villain,” Jon Cooper said afterward, “I guess, and we’re OK with it. The guys play hard, they’re a determined group. When there are obstacles in their way, they will try to get through it, anyway possible. And if it’s fighting their way through, it so be it..”
Brandon Hagel scored his third goal of the series to open the scoring 8:40 into the game before Lane Hutson tied it.
Montreal lead 2-1 in the second on Josh Anderson’s second goal of this postseason before Nikita Kucherov tied it midway though the third.
Anthony Cirelli assisted on Kucherov’s third-period goal — then fed Moser on the winner in OT.
”We knew,’’ Kucherov said, “this was going to be a long series.’’
STANLEY CUP PLAYOFFS: ROUND 1
TAMPA BAY LIGHTNING (Atl2) v MONTREAL CANADIENS (Atl3)
GAME 3
Best-of-7 Series Tied 1-1
- When: Friday, 7
- Where: Bell Centre, Montreal
- Tampa Local TV: The Spot-66
- National TV: TNT, truTV
- Streaming: HBO Max
- Season Series: Tampa Bay won 2-1
- All-time Regular Season Series: Lightning leads 63-43-11, 6 ties
- All-time Postseason Series — Lightning Lead 3-1: Won 2021 Stanley Cup Final (5 games); Won 2015 Round 2 (6); Lost 2014 Round 1 (4); Won 2004 Round 2 (4)
- Series Schedule (Tied 1-1) — Game 1: Montreal 4, Tampa Bay 3 OT (Sunday); Game 2: Tampa Bay 3, Montreal 2 OT (Tuesday); Game 3: at Montreal, 7 Friday (TNT, truTV); Game 4: at Montreal, 7 April 26 (ESPN); Game 5: at Tampa Bay, April 29 TBD; *Game 6: at Montreal, May 1 TBD; *Game 7: at Tampa Bay, May 3 TBD