Having been a Lightning season ticket holder for several years before moving to Las Vegas earlier this year, it is going to be difficult to watch tonight’s game on TV as opposed to being at Amalie Arena. That being said, I really do love the under in tonight’s game.
Let’s start with the Red Wings. Detroit’s offense was terrible this year. Their offense ranked 23rd in the NHL this season, and they are 16th out of the 16 playoff teams in goals scored with only 211 during the regular season. The most shocking thing to me about how much the Wings struggled on offense this year is that Henrik Zetterberg was their leading scorer with only 50 points. That was good for a tie for 94th in the NHL in scoring. How crazy is that stat?
Goaltending has not exactly been a strength for Detroit either. After Petr Mrazek struggled at the end of the season, the Wings went back to Jimmy Howard in goal at the end of the year and all indications are that he will start in net tonight. However, the fact that a coach has to be tight-lipped about who his starting goalie is on the eve of the playoffs is not a good sign. How does that help the under? I will get to that in a moment.
Let’s take a look at the Lightning. There is no goaltender problem here, as not only was Ben Bishop fantastic in last year’s run to the Stanley Cup Finals, but he was spectacular during the regular season this year. Ben ranked 1st in GAA with a 2.06 and was 2nd in save percentage at .926.
The biggest issue facing Tampa Bay heading into the playoffs is the unreal number of injuries this team has sustained in the past few weeks. Everybody knows Steven Stamkos is out for this series, but so is Anton Stralman. He paired with fellow Swede Victor Hedman to form the Bolts’ #1 defensive line until he broke his leg last month.
This year has been a struggle for the Lightning offensively as well. After being the NHL’s best team at scoring goals last year during the regular season, Tampa only ranked 12th this season, and that was with a healthy Stamkos and before all the injuries to other players. After Nikita Kucherov’s 66 points, which was good for only a tie for 21st in the NHL in scoring, the next highest scoring Lightning player with Steven out is Hedman, their top defensive player. And he only had 10 goals and 47 points. Kucherov missed a few games at the end of the season with an injured left foot that is still bothering him. In addition, Tyler Johnson, one of Tampa’s playoff heroes last year, took a nasty hit at Montreal last week. Even if he does play tonight, he will not be close to 100%. Ryan Callahan is also trying to return from a late season injury.
What does all of this mean? I expect some real old-time hockey tonight. No free-flowing skating or odd-man rushes to be had here. Detroit knows their offense isn’t very good and that their goaltending is a huge question mark going into this series. For that reason, I look for the Wings to play tonight’s game very close to the vest, especially on the road. Do everything you can to give your goalie help and play a very defensive-minded game. It will not take many goals to beat Tampa with their current lineup.
For the Lightning, I expect a similar game plan. With Stamkos out and all of the other injuries for Tampa, especially on the offensive end, look for them to rely on Ben Bishop knowing it shouldn’t take too many goals to beat this Wings team. Although Hedman is one of the best defensemen in the NHL, not having Stralman is a huge loss for Tampa. Those two guys would have easily gotten 30 minutes of ice team apiece if he was healthy. The weak link on this Lightning team are the 2nd and 3rd defensive lines when Victor Hedman is not on the ice, so look for John Cooper to give plenty of help to Ben Bishop by keeping his forwards from getting crazy and not getting stuck way up in Detroit’s end of the ice. I am not saying that the Bolts’ defensive corps is bad, but it is an area that Steve Yzerman every year tries to get better because he is not totally happy with that part of the team yet. At the trade deadline this year when it looked like Jonathan Drouin was going to get traded, the only reason that didn’t happen was because Yzerman was only willing to part with Drouin if another team would take on Matt Carle and his big contract. That’s how unhappy Steve was with his play this season. With the injuries and inability to make a trade, Carle is going to see lots of ice time tonight.
Three of the four games between these teams went under 5 goals this season, and I look for that trend to continue. This game isn’t going to be anything like watching the Edmonton Oilers of the 1980’s, so look for the under to come in nicely this evening. Good luck everyone.
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