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Lightning journal: Nothing’s ever easy against the Canadiens

Tampa Bay, however, is on a four-game win streak entering Saturday night’s matchup.
 
Tampa Bay Lightning left wing Adam Erne (73) celebrates his winning goal during a late December game against the Canadiens at Amalie Arena. (DOUGLAS R. CLIFFORD | Times)
Tampa Bay Lightning left wing Adam Erne (73) celebrates his winning goal during a late December game against the Canadiens at Amalie Arena. (DOUGLAS R. CLIFFORD | Times)
Published Feb. 16, 2019

TAMPA — The Lightning looks to cap a strong homestand against Montreal on Saturday night.

“Every time it seems like we see Montreal it’s a really tough game,” Tyler Johnson said after practice Friday afternoon. “It’s going to be a good test for us. It’s going to take our A-game playing against them and it should be a lot of fun.”

Former Lightning forward Jonathan Drouin will also be in mix as he returns to Amalie Arena. Drouin comes into the matchup with 17 goals and 29 assists.

The 23-year-old has made a major impact on the ice as of late. In the last five contests he has logged nine points, three goals and six assists.

Drouin, however, comes back to Tampa without notching a single point in two games, which isn’t surprising since Montreal has lost back-to-back games against Toronto and Nashville. He’ll certainly look to fix that against his old team.

The key to keeping the upper hand against the Canadiens will go back to Tampa Bay’s control of the puck on the attack.

Montreal is a team that focuses on getting the puck out of its zone quickly. The Canadiens use their speed to capitalize on such opportunities and the outcome usually falls in their favor when the opposing team loses its edge.

“They are really fast, and they are really relentless,” Yanni Gourde said. “We can’t let them feel the ice too much.”

The Lightning has been on a scoring frenzy, with 22 goals in the past four games.

“We know they’re going to battle hard for 60 minutes,” Gourde said. “We have to be even harder.”

The Lightning's alternate jerseys hang in the locker room before a recent game against the St. Louis Blues. (DIRK SHADD | Times)

Breaking in the new gear

The Lightning only has two games under its belt since donning the new alternate jerseys around Amalie Arena, but the team has actually been breaking in the gear since the players returned from the bye week and All-Star weekend.

“You don’t really need a whole lot, but I guess a week’s worth (of practices) is probably pretty good,” Johnson said. “It depends player to player.”

Johnson said having the time to break in the new look after the bye week was helpful, but it feels pretty good to switch in and out of the traditional white and blue uniforms and into the black ones now.

New gloves, pants and skates, for some, may take some getting used to, but Adam Erne doesn’t think it’s a big deal.

“I think it’s all the same,” he chuckled. “We use new gear all the time, for me it’s nothing.”

Wearing support

Mikhail Sergachev chuckled when he was asked about his Andrei Vasilevskiy T-shirt after Thursday’s game. He practically told the media members around him at the time to support the Lightning goaltender’s clothing line.

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Vasilevskiy said his line is only a couple of months old, but his teammates, like Victor Hedman, Ryan Callahan, Ryan McDonagh and Nikita Kucherov, have taken a liking to the samples he’s handed out.

His line includes T-shirts, hoodies sweatshirts and hats. One of the more prominent aspects of his brand is the baseball-style logo with the “A” and “V” overlapping much like the New York Yankees logo and the small touch of an 88 on the bottom right-hand side of the “A.”

Contact Mari Faiello at mfaiello@tampabay.com. Follow @faiello_mari.