NASHVILLE – Steven Stamkos scored in his first outdoor game, and the Tampa Bay Lightning defeated the Predators, 3-2, on Saturday evening.
“Any time you can help the team win it’s great, but when you do it in a stage like this, it was a long time coming,” Stamkos said. “I hadn’t had a chance to do this. I played a lot of years in this league, and I’m just proud to put that jersey on, go out there and represent our city in Tampa. It was kind of extra special to have a big game personally, but we wanted to come in here and get the win, and I was super happy with the effort we had tonight. It lived up to all the hype that you hear from some of the guys who have played in these games. You never understand it until you play in one yourself, so it’s nice to say we have that experience now.”
Andrei Vasilevskiy made 26 saves in the Bolts win.
“Yes, it’s one of 82, but this was a little bit bigger than that,” Lightning head coach Jon Cooper said. “If you’re trying to sell the game in a town that’s really bought into hockey, no better way to do it. For me to look back on this, I’ll just have warm feelings. It’s icing on the cake that we pulled it out.”
Tampa improved to 34-11-6.
“I thought they got some juice from the power-play goals and then credit to them, they checked hard up ice and we didn’t do a great job getting up and out or our zone,” Nashville head coach John Hynes said. “But I think if you look at our third period versus their second period, I think it flipped.”
Tanner Jeannot and Filip Forsberg were the Predators strikers.
“It was great. It was fun,” Forsberg said. “Obviously, the fans showed up for both teams. It was an awesome atmosphere. The conditions were great, too. The weather was perfect. The ice was good. Great experience overall, except for the result.”
Nikita Kucherov and Brayden Point also scored for Tampa.
“For a lot of us, this was our first experience in this atmosphere, and it kind of blew it out of the water,” Stamkos said. “It was amazing.”
Nashville dropped to 30-19-4.
“I trust those boys that are out there at the end of the game to get it done. They’ve proven it time and time again,” the Predators’ Colton Sissons said. “They had a little scramble in front there and I thought might have squeaked one in, but it didn’t go our way.”
Juuse Saros made 30 saves in the Nashville loss.
“It was incredible,” Jeannot said. “It was good to pot one and have the boys get all excited for that and get the crowd into it.”
You must be logged in to post a comment.