The Tampa Bay Lightning defeated the Florida Panthers on Monday night to sweep their second round series and advance to the third round for the third year in a row.
Lightning netminder
Andrei Vasilevskiy made 49 saves in Game 4 to record the shutout. In his last seven series clinching games since the start of the 2020 Stanley Cup Playoffs, the 27-year-old has six shutouts, a .974 save percentage and a 0.77 GAA.
What Vasilevskiy is doing is nothing short of heroic. He's been an extremely important piece to their team when they've won the Stanley Cup in 2020 and 2021. At times during the series with Toronto, he didn't look at his best, but since Game 6 of that series, Vasilevskiy has shown and proven that he is one of the best, if not the best, goaltender in Stanley Cup Playoff history.
After the game, Lightning forward Alex Killorn and head coach Jon Cooper spoke about what it means to have Vasilevskiy between the pipes.
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"There is never a doubt in our locker room. And a goalie's job, that if you want to be elite, is to give your team a chance to win," Cooper said.
He added, "It can probably be a little bit demoralizing on the other side, when you look at him and you just don't feel like you can score."
Killorn said, "It's pretty impressive. I think when we look back and we're older, that's going to be something that stays there for a long time. It's pretty cool to play with a player that I think will go down as one of the best goalies that's ever played the game. That's how you gauge players, is how they perform in big-time games, and he's been nothing but tremendous in these games."
Vasilevskiy and the Lightning will now have roughly a week off before they face the Carolina Hurricanes or the New York Rangers in the Eastern Conference Final.
Source:
theScore.
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