The veteran of more than 1,400 NHL games and 965 points has scored 13 goals and 30 points over 53 games this season, his 21st in the league.<\/p>\n
Lightning fans also got to see the physical forward fight on Sunday, his second game back with the franchise.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s been great for us so far. Just his demeanor on the bench, his play on the ice,\u201d coach Jon Cooper said. \u201cHe\u2019s got a knack for the net. You put him around there, usually he\u2019s gonna tap it in. It\u2019s been good for him.\u201d<\/p>\n
Perry saw time on the team\u2019s second power-play unit in Tuesday\u2019s game against Columbus. As Tampa Bay head coach Jon Cooper said, the locker room has already been ignited by Perry\u2019s addition.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt’s amazing,\u201d forward Zemgus Girgensons said of becoming teammates with Perry. \u201cHe\u2019s an amazing player, a great guy. It\u2019s nice to get to know him, and he brings a lot to our team. Good addition.\u201d<\/p>\n
Longtime Bolt Brayden Point was here for Perry\u2019s first stint with the team. He applauded the move to bring back a player who can score while also elevating the compete level of every teammate he meets.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe adds some offense for sure. You\u2019ve seen already he\u2019s got two goals here with us, and just that leadership,\u201d Point said of what Perry brings to the team. “He\u2019s obviously played a ton of games and been in some big moments. He\u2019s gonna be a guy we need to lean on in the future.”<\/p>\n
Perry played in the previous two Stanley Cup Finals as a member of the Edmonton Oilers and has reached the Cup Final six times. He won the penultimate NHL award in 2007 with the Anaheim Ducks.<\/p>\n
And yet, his hunger hasn\u2019t faded.<\/p>\n
Even in year 21, his sole goal is to win the Stanley Cup as a member of the Tampa Bay Lightning.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t know any different than having that passion and wanting to win,\u201d Perry said. \u201cThat\u2019s why you grow up as a kid is having that chance and being a part of something. That\u2019s what it\u2019s all about.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The veteran of more than 1,400 NHL games and 965 points has scored 13 goals and 30 points…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":188697,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[135,137,136],"class_list":["post-188696","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tampa","tag-tampa","tag-tampa-headlines","tag-tampa-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/188696","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=188696"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/188696\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/188697"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=188696"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=188696"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=188696"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}