Through six games, the Lightning have had two subpar outings. This one\u2013like the first\u2013came against the New York Rangers.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Simply put, the Lightning were outplayed in this contest. The Rangers spent most of the night skating on their toes, and the Lightning didn\u2019t. New York executed at a higher level both with and without the puck.<\/p>\n
It only took 62 seconds for the Rangers to get on the board. Following a New York dump-in from the neutral zone, Tye Kartye raced to retrieve the puck behind the Lightning net. An initial centering pass to Alexis Lafreni\u00e8re was blocked, but the puck bounced back to Kartye. With the Lightning scrambling to recover, Lafreni\u00e8re moved into the low slot and got open. This time, Kartye fed him the puck, and Lafreni\u00e8re one-timed it in to give the Rangers the lead.<\/p>\n
At 12:47, Kartye and Lafreni\u00e8re teamed up again. From the Rangers defensive zone, Kartye lofted a backhand out to center ice. Lafreni\u00e8re reached it first and converted on the ensuring breakaway, putting a shot into the top of the net.<\/p>\n
The Lightning got one back when Pontus Holmberg chipped a puck off the boards from the defensive zone, creating a two-on-one rush chance for Zemgus Girgensons and Ilya Mikheyev. Girgensons roofed a shot from the right circle over the glove of Dylan Garand at 17:26.<\/p>\n
The Lightning carried play over the final couple of minutes of the first period but couldn\u2019t tie the game. That stretch would prove to be their best segment of the night.<\/p>\n
The second period was scoreless until the Rangers amped up their forechecking intensity in the closing minutes. They pressured the Lightning into defensive-zone turnovers, which helped them extend offensive-zone shifts. One of those sequences led to Will Cuylle\u2019s deflection goal at 18:26.<\/p>\n
The Rangers clamped things down in the third. The Lightning struggled to create scoring chances\u2014or even possession time. Two power-play chances yielded little, and on the second, they allowed a shorthanded empty-net goal to Mika Zibanejad. Overall, the Lightning managed to post only 14 third-period shot attempts.<\/p>\n
The Lightning rebounded well after their earlier loss in New York. They\u2019ll try to do it again when they host Seattle on Thursday.<\/p>\n
Lightning Radio Three Stars of the Game:<\/p>\n
Alexis Lafreni\u00e8re \u2014 Rangers. Two goals.<\/p>\n
J.T. Miller \u2014 Rangers. Assist. 16-4 on faceoffs.<\/p>\n
Tye Kartye \u2014 Rangers. Two assists.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Through six games, the Lightning have had two subpar outings. This one\u2013like the first\u2013came against the New York…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":427278,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[135,137,136],"class_list":["post-427277","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\/427277","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=427277"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/427277\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/427278"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=427277"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=427277"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=427277"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}