It’s of little consolation now, but the Tampa Bay Lightning were historically good during the 2018-2019 NHL regular season. They finished with a record of 62-16-4 and 128 points putting them in fourth place all time. In third place just one point ahead is the 1977-78 Montreal Canadiens and four points ahead for the best regular season in NHL history is the 1976-77 Canadiens. Unfortunately for Tampa Bay, all similiarities with the aforementioned Habs teams end there. The mid-70’s Montreal teams are considered to be among the greatest in hockey history and in both 1976-77 and 1977-78 they steamrolled the competition in the playoffs en route to back to back Stanley Cup titles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Lightning are on the verge of a monumental collapse. It would be worse than the failure of the 2nd all time NHL points team–the 1995-96 Detroit Red Wings–who were eliminated in the Eastern Conference Finals in 6 games. It’s difficult to even come up with a hypothetical scenario of how Tampa Bay’s playoffs could have gone any worse to this point. The blown 3-0 lead on home ice in Game One was bad but the real travesty was their failure to respond in Game Two where Columbus opened up a 3-0 lead en route to a 5-1 victory. Most expansion teams wouldn’t give up 7 unanswered goals on home ice, let alone the best regular season team in the league. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Tampa Bay showed some fight in the third period of Game Three without suspended scoring leader Nikita Kucherov. After a miserable 3 shot first period the Lightning showed some urgency for the first time this series in the third period down 2-0. Tampa Bay put up 17 shots in the third but Columbus goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky made 16 saves to secure the victory. Every sports fan knows the significance of being down 0-3 in a best of seven series. A comeback isn’t quite as unprecedented in the NHL as in other sports. In baseball, basketball and hockey there have been 360 teams to fall behind 0-3 in a best of seven series. Only six made the comeback with four in the NHL. Only one of those six teams were able to win a Game 4 on enemy ice. That gives teams leading 3-0 with Game Four at home an all-time series winning percentage of 98.7%. NHL teams in that situation are 46-1 all time for a 97.9 winning percentage. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Historical precedent doesn’t provide much hope of the Lightning avoiding the sweep. In all sports with a 7 game series the team up 3-0 playing Game 4 at home wins at a 72.2% clip. In the NHL, they win at a 63.8% rate. Nikita Kucherov will be back for Tampa Bay but defenseman Victor Hedman has been downgraded to ‘Doubtful’. It might be at the point where injuries don’t matter and it remains to be seen whether Tampa Bay has enough fight left to take the series back to Florida for a Game Five. The only way they could have lost this series was to give Columbus a jolt of confidence and that’s exactly what happened. Given how well Columbus has played and the daunting odds of coming back from a 0-3 hole look for the Jackets to complete the sweep on Tuesday. With the NHL hockey odds<\/a> showing the home team as a +121 underdog the price is definitely right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n