Three things we learned from the Lightning’s loss to the Wild

ST. PAUL, Minn. — The Lightning had a lot working against them in their 5-1 loss to the Wild on Wednesday night.

They hadn’t had much success at the Xcel Energy Center, where they haven’t won a game in more than 11 years. They arrived in the Twin Cities early Wednesday morning in the middle of a snow storm following a postgame flight in Chicago. The Wild, meanwhile, were well-rested, having not played since Saturday.

Add in the fact that starting goaltender Andrei Vasilevskiy was pulled from the lineup at the last minute, unable to play with an illness, and the Lightning had to push backup Brian Elliott back into action for the second straight night, marking the first time he started both ends of back-to-back games since 2017.

Then the Lightning didn’t get the bounces they probably needed to overcome that adversity. Minnesota’s first goal was scored when a puck went off defenseman Nick Perbix’s skate and into the net. After the Lightning climbed back to cut the lead to two goals in the second, a Jared Spurgeon shot attempt destined to go wide changed trajectory and found the back of the net after going off Sam Steel’s skate.

“Stuff went their way tonight for them,” Lightning coach Jon Cooper said. “Kind of a perfect storm ... it’s our fifth game in eight nights. They’ve been here rested. They’ve played two games in a week. It’s not a complaint, it happens to every team. But they took advantage of the situation that worked out in their favor and good on them. We had to have everything go well for us tonight. It just didn’t.”

Here are three things we learned from the Lightning’s loss:

You can’t plan for illness

The Lightning typically have their goaltending assignments planned out well ahead of time, and recently their slotting had worked out extremely well, even during the latest stretch when Vasilevskiy started three games in four days.

Vasilevskiy was slated to start Wednesday, but when Cooper found out just before warmups that Vasilevskiy wouldn’t be able to go, Elliott was pushed into action 24 hours after a 25-save performance in Chicago and after working out at the rink Wednesday morning thinking he wouldn’t play.

Elliott yielded four goals on 32 shots, but two goals hit skates, and his line of sight was taken away by a screen in front on another. He survived an early barrage, only allowing the goal off Perbix’s skate in a first period in which Minnesota had 20 5-on-5 shot attempts.

“It’s really tough on a goalie, especially on the back-to-back and getting in at whatever, two, three in the morning and he’s thinking he’s not playing,” Lightning captain Steven Stamkos said. “He comes in, has a morning skate after back-to-back and then he finds out he’s got to play. So it’s a tough situation for a player, never mind a goalie, to have to do that. He showed a lot of character and he’s a pro, and I thought he deserved better.”

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Second period continues to bedevil Lightning

The Lightning have had some great starts, and some solid finishes, but their most inconsistent play has come in the second period all season. In Wednesday’s loss, they were outscored 3-1 in the middle 20 minutes. On the season, they have been outscored 36-33, the only period in which they don’t have more goals than their opponent.

After falling behind by a goal after one period, the Lightning started the second strong, but once Kirill Kaprizov scored on their first power play, the game started to snowball on Tampa Bay. Less than two minutes after Kaprizov’s goal, defenseman Calen Addison freed himself for a shot from the point that went through a Matt Boldy screen in front and through Elliott.

From there, the Lightning found themselves chasing the game down 3-0. Brayden Point kept Tampa Bay from being scoreless in the period with a power-play goal, then Steel’s answer with 4:25 left in the second made it a three-goal game again.

“That was a turning point of the game it felt like,” defenseman Victor Hedman said. “We had a good start for second period, a lot of zone time, a lot of good looks, but that power-play goal and then they scored two minutes later, it was tougher to come back being down 3-0. I liked the way we battled throughout the 60 minutes but it wasn’t our night.”

Kirill Kaprizov is the best player we don’t see enough of

The 25-year-old Wild star is one of the game’s top young players, but Lightning fans only see him a few times a season because he’s in the Western Conference.

It’s clear that Kaprizov is the engine that makes the Wild go, and that his energy on the ice is something that his teammates feed off of.

Kaprizov scored what might have been the biggest goal of the night with a redirection from the slot on the power play, giving Minnesota a 2-0 lead at the 7:09 mark of the second period.

Boldy fed Kaprizov, who used his hands and positioning to redirect the puck between his legs and past defenseman Erik Cernak and Elliott. The puck wasn’t especially quick coming off Kaprizov’s stick, but he has the perfect touch to leave the Lightning looking.

But Kaprizov’s best play wasn’t on a goal. He closed in on the net and flung a shot behind him between his legs that beat Elliott but hit off the crossbar and off.

Kaprizov added an empty net goal late in the third period.

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