Lightning Top Canadiens, move with one Stanley Cup win, repeat

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MONTREAL–Tyler Johnson and the Tampa Bay Lightning’s sprinter secured victory away from their title defense with a 6-3 victory over the Montreal Canadiens on Friday night in Game Three of the Stanley Cup Final.

Lightning caught the Canadians flat-footed by scoring two goals in the opening minutes of each of the first two periods to take a 3-0 lead in the series. Fourth game Monday night in Montreal.

Tampa Bay is in a position to join Pittsburgh (2016 and 17) to become the second team to win back-to-back titles since 1999. The Lightning team also has a chance to complete their first sweep of the Final since Detroit’s victory over Washington in 1998.

“The Stanley Cup is enough motivation for us as hockey players,” said defender Victor Hedmann of the chance to become the second repeat champion since 1999.

“Obviously what we did in the bubble last year was very special, and you want to live that moment again, but at the end of the day, we’re not there yet,” he added, referring to the Lightning’s six-game win over Dallas last year in the final. held in Edmonton, Alberta. “We are not satisfied until this is done.”

Johnson scored two goals, and Hedman and Nikita Korcherov scored a goal and assist. Jan Ruta and Blake Coleman also scored, with an empty net, for Lightning, who also won the cup in 2004. Andrei Vasilevsky stopped 31 shots.

Vasilevsky inexplicably panned to let Nick Suzuki’s shot from the right circle beat him through his legs to cut Tampa Bay’s lead to 4-2 with 1:56 left in the second half. The goalkeeper responded by stopping the first eight shots he encountered in the third half, including Joel Jeremiah from approaching, before Johnson scored his second to put Lightning ahead 5-2 with 4:41 left.

Tyler Johnson (left) celebrates his goal during Lightning’s Game 3 win on Friday. Getty Images

The game was the first NHL game played in July, a year after its first games were played in August.

Playing his first Stanley Cup Final since a 4-1 win over the Los Angeles Kings led by Wayne Gretzky in Game Five at the Montreal Forum on June 9, 1993, he did little to excite the Canadians. Nor did interim coach Dominique Ducharme return for the Canadian team, which won 8-2 in two games at Tampa Bay.

One of Ducharme’s first moves was to take the only timeout for Montreal after the Lightning scored 1:35 apart to build a 2-0 3:27 inch lead. Ducharme has spent the past two weeks in mandatory quarantine in Montreal after testing positive for COVID-19.

The Canadians’ respectable defense and stellar goal by Carrie Price that led them into the shock playoff round proved no match for Lightning.

“I could definitely play better. He’s not good enough yet,” Price, who has lost five goals on 25 shots, said.

He is not the only one.

Montreal fell 2-1 after one period, opening the second.

Defenseman Erik Cernak caught the two Canadians sleeping on a streak change for Kucherov to score 2-on-0-break 1:40 in the period. From the depths of his territory, Cernac sent a passage dedicated to Ondrej Balat at the Blue Line of Montreal. Bales chased the ball into the left circle and fed Kocherov, who flipped it in the open right side.

Johnson scored 1:53 later in the 2-on-1 break and after Price blocked Matthew Joseph’s shot from the left circle. The bouncing ball bounced off Joseph’s skate and straight to Johnson, who hit it with a backhand into the open right side.

Lightning scored the opening goal in all three matches and has yet to fall behind in the series.

“We have a game plan, right?” Kucherov said. “Everyone buys and everyone does their job. And when everyone does their job, it makes it easier and we all play the full 60 minutes the right way.”

Philip Danault and Corey Perry also scored for a side that felt disrespected for a Montreal side in their deepest playoff since winning their 24th Cup. The Canadians entered the post-season with the worst record of the 16 NHL playoffs before rallying from a 3-1 deficit in the first round against Toronto, sweeping Winnipeg in the second round and then eliminating Vegas in a six-game semi-final series.

“We don’t have a choice,” Price said. “We’ve been over adversity all season, clearly against the wall, so we have to start giving our best.”

In the history of the NHL playoffs, only four teams rallied to win a series after losing the first three games, and Toronto was the only one to do so in the final beating Detroit to win the Cup in 1942. The Los Angeles Kings were the last team to overcome a 3-0 group deficit by defeating Detroit San Jose in the 2014 first round series.

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