Contrary to legend, Lightning CAN strike twice

After falling 3-0 to Tampa Bay earlier this month behind the power that is the "Always Available" Power of Mario Lemieux, the recently-slumping Boston Bruins and recently-surging Tampa Bay Lightning squared off again. This time around though, the Bruins defense was decimated - down Sean Brown and Matt Walker, forced to dress a sweater-filler to fill the roster - while Lightning management claimed the offense was "weak and non-functional... this could be a disaster for us."

The "sputtering" Lightning offense found the back of the net three times against the home team, took three more shots than the hosts, and left with a 3-0 victory. If the best defense is a good offense, or vice versa, or whatever - the Lightning had it. Boston saw the wrong side of a shutout just one game after blanking the Florida Panthers. This time, Kari Lehtonen played the Hula Hoop Hero.

Obviously, Mother Nature and her submissive bottom, Ryan Long, conspired to prove that whomever said "Lightning doesn't strike twice" was a big fat honkin' liar.

Boston's patchwork defense held for most of the first period as the front line tried to keep the puck at the far side of the rink. Ten shots were fired at Lehtonen in the first period, though he deflected them all.

With less than three minutes to play in the period, though, Marc "I Wish I Were Denis" Savard beat Raycroft and the two posts of stone standing on either side of the net for his seventeenth goal of the season and the 1-0 lead. Milan Hejduk and Eric Brewer were credited with assists on the tally, the first point of a big day for Hejduk.

In the second, once again, the Bruins defense held tough for most the period, then broke down with fatigue. Hejduk scored his first of the game, number twenty-three on the year, at 11:43, this time taking the feed from Savard. The second was marred by a total offensive lull from Boston, who took just five shots on goal in the period.

The third period just got ugly. To begin, Hejduk pocketed his second mark of the game, a Kyle Calder and Robert Svehla assisted goal to make the scored three-naught. Apparently, the Lightning defense is a little brain dead, though, and misunderstood the concept of the trap - choosing to physically trap the Blackhawks players and prevent scoring.

In order, at 10:48 Kyle McLaren was boxed for unsportsmanlike conduct, Dan Cleary at 12:22 for charging, Jeff Jillson at 18:00 for elbowing, and Cleary again at 18:22 for a game-misconduct minor. In the process, he injured yet another Bruins defenseman, Lars Jonnson to earn an ejection. Even worse, with only six seconds left in the game, Peter Sykora was apparently hit by a sniper's rifle from the upper deck and crumpled to the ice, injured.

Somehow, despite almost two and a half minutes of five-on-three hockey, and four power plays in the period, the Bruins managed a meager four shots on goal, while the Lightning took only three.

The game ended with an unnamed injured Bruins player pissing on the clothes of the Lightning second line while the game was wrapping up. No charges have been filed yet, though WGBH has offered a handsome reward for his name - so they can give him a new golden showerhead for his home.

"On the plus side, we held their first line and shutdown Mario Lemieux," GM Joshua Anderson stated after the game. "If we had been full strength - shit, even three-quarters strength - I think this would have been a win. But those are the breaks, we'll see how Lars and Peter are, and go from there."

A healthy crowd of 17,515 turned out for the game.