SantaFeToday.com Santa Fe’s Hometown News
By Arnie Leshin
It was a foregone conclusion that after the underdog New York Islanders were embarrassed 8-0 at the Tampa Bay Lightning in game 5 of the Western Conference National Hockey League semifinals, they were a goner.
Down 3-2 in the series, and playing game 6 in what would be their final time playing before their die-hard fans in the Nassau Veteran’s Coliseum, they
applied their grit and came away with a 3-2 overtime win.
Still, for game 7 they were back in Tampa Bay and the consensus was that there was no way they could get past the defending champions despite the game 6 thriller.
But lo and behold, they arrived for Friday night‘s game and almost won the damn game before losing by the slimmest of margins, 1-0, when the Lighting scored on a shorthanded goal by Yanni Gourde, and instead of again running up the score, they resorted to defense to keep the visitors off the scoreboard in a hard-fought contest before a 14,805 turnout, five thousand less then capacity, something New York would always bring in at its Long Island home ice.
The Isles took shots that were stopped by goalkeeper Andrei Vasilevskiy, they often came up ice but were roughed up along the boards, and still they made a game of it before the final buzzer when Tampa Bay leaped over its bench to celebrate while its fans tossed a load of items onto the ice that had to be cleared away when the teams lined for the usual hand shaking, congrats, and some hugs that is not seen in any other professional sports.
Kudos to the NHL, the players drop their helmets and scrape and fight, they are nasty and vocal with each other, but when a Stanley Cup game is over, the lining up is honorable, friendly, and a dandy way to forget the battles that occurred in the game.
Said Tampa Bay head coach Jon Cooper: “We never took the Islanders lightly, we knew they had no quit and saw that in games 6 and 7. They just kept on battling, keeping the scoring down, and if not for our defense, could have even left here with the deciding game win.”
Yes, close, but it’s still the Lightning in quest of a second-straight championship when it goes against the surprising Eastern Division champion Montreal Canadiens, the 4th-seeded, lowly 500-1 pre-season pick to reach their 32nd Stanley Cup finals, and there they are going for their record 25th hoisting of the prestigious Cup.
Again, they are underdogs and Tampa Bay gets home ice, but Montreal, which can allow about only 4,000 into its historic Bell Centre by way of the pandemic restrictions (Tampa Bay can fill its place, but doesn’t), upset the red-hot Toronto Maple Leafs, then the Winnipeg Jets, and then the Vegas Golden Knights with a game 7 goal in overtime before whatever die-hard fans were in seats and a huge turnout outside in Montreal Square.
The celebration continued all night, the next morning, the next night, and is probably still going on in the hockey-mad city.
It could have been the Islanders they would have been facing, but the play of defense man Ryan McDonagh, who blocked a number of New York shots, and the solo goal that was assisted on a nifty pass from Anthony Cirelli at 1:49 of the second period and got past Islanders’ goalie Semyon Valamov, who otherwise had a stellar game with 22 saves, four more than Vasilevskiy, paved the way for the home side.
“It’s disappointing,” said Isles’ head coach Barry Trotz, who previously coached the Washington Capitols to a Stanley Cup title, “and that’s because before the McDonagh shot block and their goal, there was an opportunity for us to do something against them. As for the goal, we weren’t paying enough attention and it wound up in back of the net.”
Where do the Islanders go next, well it will be to their sparkling new arena in Belmont Park in Elmont that is expected to open in October. Guaranteed, there will be a large number of fiery fans from the Coliseum in Long Island lining up there for tickets.
Oh, and game 1 of the Stanley Cup finals will be Monday night in Tampa Bay.
