Photo: Greg Flume
The Lightning, who hail from Tampa Bay, in the state of Florida, visit the District of Columbia tonight to play a National Hockey League contest.
You may have heard that Tampa’s best player, and one of the best players in the league, Steven Stamkos, is an unrestricted free agent at the end of the season. In case you missed it, Stamkos recently “liked” a tweet that talked about him possibly signing with the Toronto Maple Leafs. Some Leafs’ fans and media folks have interpreted this Twitter “like” as a binding contract for the Canadian-born sniper.
If you haven’t heard about Stamkos, that ends now. As you read about and watch the 7 PM tilt from Verizon, you’ll likely hear about him endlessly, including here. So, being the thoughtful neighbors that we are, here’s a Stamkos drinking game for you to play throughout the rest of the day. If you don’t drink, sub with a bite of your favorite food.
- “Stamkos” and “contract” are used in the same sentence: one drink.
- Stamkos’ relationship with head coach Jon Cooper is mentioned: two drinks
- A max contract is talked about: two drinks
- The Leafs are mentioned as a destination: five drinks
- Stamkos’ Twitter “likes” are brought up: 10 drinks
- A reference is made to Stamkos playing for the Caps: finish your drink
Please leave your own additions in the comments.
The game is at 7 PM and will brought to you by all of our favorite people on CSN.
| Team | Record | Possession | PDO | Power Play | Penalty Kill |
| Washington Capitals | 22-6-2 | 51.8% | 101.9 | 22.9% | 83.3% |
| Tampa Bay Lightning | 16-13-3 | 51.6% | 101.3 | 16.5% | 78.1% |
Projected Lineup
No morning skate today, so we’ll assume not changes until told otherwise.
Ovechkin – Backstrom – Oshie
Johansson – Kuznetsov – Williams
Chimera – Beagle – Wilson
Laich – Latta – Burakovsky
Schmidt – Carlson
Alzner – Niskanen
Orlov – Chorney
Holtby
Know Your Lightning
If you want some more Steven Stamkos talk, here’s Travis Yost theorizing that Stamkos’ play has dipped recently due to quality of his linemates. Some guy, possibly me, wrote about this a couple of weeks ago and I’m not sure I agree with Yost on this one.
But the Lightning have plenty of players worth knowing about beyond just Stamkos. Victor Hedman and Anton Stralman are two defensemen who don’t get as much attention as they deserve, but both are capable of driving play while playing first pair minute.
Jonathan Druin is a former third overall pick who hasn’t reached his potential yet, but is exciting to watch. Much like Tom Wilson, Drouin is not a bust.
Leave your “Know Your Lightning” tidbit in the comments, please.
Storylines
- Say it with me: The importance of faceoffs is often overstated.
- A whole bunch of people had a whole bunch of things to say about the Wilson match penalty. The match penalty has now been rescinded.
- The Caps’ throwback uniforms look awesome.
- Jason Chimera is playing in his 900th game tonight and is still a very fast skater.
- Braden Holtby: Hart Trophy candidate?
- Pavel Bure said nice things about Evgeny Kuznetsov.
- The Caps are putting a few streaks on the line tonight.
- Caps-Bolts tilts usually have a lot of goal scoring.
- Chris Brown has been waived. John Scott too.
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Watch how people react to being called beautiful.
