The Tampa Bay Lightning beat the Montreal Canadiens 5-4 in a shootout on Sunday. After a sluggish start to the season, the Bolts have surged up the standings and sit second in the Atlantic Division. Lightning coach Jon Cooper thinks they got more than they deserved from Sunday's performance, and said as much after the game.
“I think anybody that was watching this game knows that the better team that played 65 minutes tonight didn't get the two points,” Cooper said, per NHL.com's Corey Long. “But am I upset about it? No. Because there are 82 games and you need to scrape points anyway you can. A lot of games this year we've walked away from scratching our heads like how did we not get a point out of that.”
Cooper is confident that his club was outplayed by the Canadiens despite the final score. MoneyPuck.com agrees with Cooper, as the Habs had 3.58 expected goals compared to 2.55 for the Lightning at five-on-five.
The Lightning took a 3-0 lead into the second intermission thanks to two goals from Nikita Kucherov. But the Canadiens tilted the ice in the third period, potting four goals to force overtime. While the Bolts won in the shootout, Cooper was not impressed.
The Lightning have now won four games in a row ahead of a New Year's Eve matchup with the Anaheim Ducks. Despite the slow start to the year and worse depth than they had in their Stanley Cup years, they have pulled it together before the New Year.
It could be a big year coming up for Cooper, who will lead Team Canada at the Olympic Games in February. He could join Mike Babcock as the only Canadians to win Olympic Gold and a Stanley Cup as the head coach. Mike Sullivan looks to become the first American to achieve that goal.
