Off to a perfect 5-0-0 record at home, the Tampa Bay Lightning head west for a demanding three-game road trip that begins Tuesday night in Las Vegas against the defending Western Conference champion Vegas Golden Knights.
The trip also includes a challenging back-to-back with games played at high altitude against the Colorado Avalanche on Friday in Denver followed by a Saturday contest in Salt Lake City against the Utah Mammoth. The Lightning’s three opponents had combined for a glossy 19-7-1 record heading into play Monday.
“You know, that’s a bear of a road trip,” veteran Tampa Bay defenseman John Carlson said following practice in Florida on Monday. “I think you kind of stay singularly focused on what you can do, and that’s tomorrow night (against the Golden Knights).”
Vegas leads the NHL in wins (eight) and points (16) and brings in a three-game win streak, having registered 6-2 victories in back-to-back home wins over the Calgary Flames and Pittsburgh Penguins. The Golden Knights lead the league in goals scored (41) and goal differential (plus-17).
Tampa Bay, tied for second in the Atlantic Division with 12 points, is just 1-2-0 on the road so far but is 4-4-0 all-time in games played against the Golden Knights in Las Vegas and holds an 8-5-3 series edge.
The Lightning have won six of their past seven games overall.
“We’ve taken care of business here (at home), which has been great,” Lightning coach Jon Cooper said. “We’re 1-2 on the road, and now we’re going west, multiple time-zone changes. These three teams sit there and you could put them in a grouping of the class of the West. So this is a legitimate early-season test for us.”
The same could be said of the Tuesday contest for Vegas. Although the Golden Knights have won eight of 10 games overall, including seven of their past eight, only two of the victories have come against teams with winning records, they haven’t faced many top-notch foes.
First-year Vegas head coach Ryan Craig was asked if playing against Tampa Bay, which played in three consecutive Stanley Cup Finals from 2020-2022, winning twice, might give him a better read about his team.
“Well, I think we have a pretty good read on our team through 10 games,” Craig replied. “I think we’ve been pushed at different times. As for our opponents, we play the team that’s here.”
The Golden Knights jumped out to a 2-0 first-period lead in an eventual 6-2 victory over the Flames on Thursday and followed that up with a 3-0 first-period lead en route to a 6-2 win over the Penguins on Saturday.
Center Jack Eichel, who leads Vegas with 18 points, notched two assists against Pittsburgh. He has 13 assists on the season, which ranks second in the NHL behind the 17 of Edmonton’s Connor McDavid.
“It’s obviously nice to lead the game after a couple minutes,” said defenseman Rasmus Andersson, who gave Vegas a 1-0 lead just 66 seconds into the contest on Saturday. “We know it’s not going to happen every night, but when it happens, we’ll definitely take it.”
Craig pointed to the win over the Penguins as one of the better performances by his team.
“Pittsburgh posed a good challenge for us,” Craig said. “A desperate team, one that we had to be very much aware of on the rush and in transition. That was going to be a key for us. We’ll regroup now and get ready for Tampa on Tuesday.”