Sometimes we forget. We get so caught up in the playoff race, the points behind, the projected chances of making it, the games that could swing the playoff race, the magic numbers, the teams to leapfrog, that we forget it’s not just about sneaking in the postseason for some teams.
The Carolina Hurricanes? For sure. If they get in, it’s about getting in. It would be a heck of an accomplishment. That's true for the Toronto Maple Leafs, too. If they make the playoffs, that accomplishment alone says so much about their growth this season and their potential for the near future. It would be an important step in the development of a franchise not far from greatness.
The Tampa Bay Lightning are a completely different story. This isn’t a team that has eyes only on finding a way to scrap and claw their way into the playoffs for the sake of making the playoffs.
“If you make the playoffs and lose in the first round, does it change anything?” Lightning coach Jon Cooper said, throwing a dose of reality into the Lightning’s current fight.
In their case, no. No it doesn’t.
The Lightning, kind of like the 2010-11 Los Angeles Kings, are that rare team that can sneak into the playoffs on the final day of the season and be considered a team very much capable of winning it all.
That was their mentality heading into this season. That remains their mentality right now.
“Our goal is to win the Stanley Cup,” Cooper said. “It’s not just to get in to the playoffs. If you make the playoffs, you’re like, 'OK, we made it.' If you’re out in the first round, what has that done? I remember my first year in the league, we were out in six days. Six days, our playoffs lasted. Was our team better for that?”
Actually, yeah, it was.
The Lightning at that point were at a different point in their development. Cooper was in his first full season as a coach. That playoff experience helped him as a young coach during Tampa Bay’s next two postseasons.
It helped his young core get a taste of what postseason hockey was all about. That brief playoff appearance for the Lightning in 2013-14 marked the playoff debut for the Triplets -- Nikita Kucherov, Tyler Johnson and Ondrej Palat. One year later, those three were the reason Tampa Bay advanced to the Stanley Cup finals to face the Blackhawks.
That 2013-14 Lightning team is this year’s Maple Leafs, Oilers and Hurricanes if they can get in. Just making it does mean something.
That’s not the case with the Lightning now.
“No. Absolutely not,” said Tampa Bay defenseman Victor Hedman, who has played himself into Norris Trophy consideration. “We want to be a team like Detroit -- 25 straight years. They’re a good measuring stick.”
And just as important, there were four Stanley Cup wins in those 25 years.
“We want to be in the playoffs. That’s our standard. That’s the team we are,” Hedman said. “It’s so much fun to be a part of this organization. They always have the goal to go deep in the playoffs.”
Then Hedman shared a glimpse into the psyche of this Lightning team that has been played out over and over.
I admitted to Hedman that I thought the Lightning were toast after a loss to the Coyotes gave them a three-game losing streak last week. It’s hard to overcome that kind of slip at this point in the season. Especially with other teams to leapfrog in the standings.
He looked back like it didn’t even occur to him and his teammates that they might be in trouble.
“I think it fueled us even more,” he said.
They’re definitely walking a tight rope, but the Lightning do seem to be a team that responds remarkably well to adversity. They win games without their captain and leading goal scorer around. They run off a bunch of wins after trading starting goalie Ben Bishop and popular center Brian Boyle. They lose to the lottery-bound Coyotes then run off another win streak.
Perhaps no game captured how adversity fuels the Lightning quite like Monday’s win over the Blackhawks.
They were down early. Cooper pulled the goalie. They had a three-goal deficit against a team that could very well win a Stanley Cup this spring. This was like the Lightning season all wrapped into one game.
They rallied and won in overtime, Hedman and Jonathan Drouin absolutely dominating the 3-on-3 session, while a guy who played a majority of the season in the AHL, Yanni Gourde, ended the overtime with the game-winning goal.
That sums up how their season will have to play out. The remaining healthy core players on the roster, the Hedmans, Palats, Drouins and Kucherovs, are going to have to play at a star level while getting timely contributions from the call-ups.
“Over the last two and a half months, the regulars we’ve had in the lineup have elevated their game, and the kids have given us needed minutes to survive,” Cooper said.
The core players have found another gear, especially Kucherov. Cooper pinpointed a February game against the Avalanche as the moment he saw his star winger find a new level. In the three games before that one, Kucherov registered a combined total of two shots on goal, and there was a conversation between coach and player about looking to shoot first rather than pass.
Kucherov finished with nine shots on goal against the Avs. He didn’t score or finish with a point, but it was a sign that good things were to come.
In the 17 games since, Kucherov has 17 goals and 31 (!) points. It’s the most in the league in that stretch, with Calgary’s Johnny Gaudreau second, with 23 points. Patrick Kane is the closest in the goal department with 14.
It’s a run to end the season that's similar to the one that Corey Perry made to close out the season in 2010-11 and win a Hart Trophy. There tends to be recency bias when it comes to awards voting, and Kucherov strapping the Lightning to his back and getting them into the playoffs would go a long way in his Hart consideration.
“When Kooch is getting in the three- to six-shots range, pucks go in for guys like him,” Cooper said. “That’s what he’s doing. He’s creating space for himself. ... He’s got the gift. Pucks have eyes for certain guys in the league.”
The win against Chicago increased the Lightning’s playoff chances to 29.81 percent, according to MoneyPuck.com. That's still not great, if we’re looking only at the numbers. But interestingly enough, their Stanley Cup chances (2.6 percent) are currently just about the same as a couple teams comfortably in playoff spots, like the Senators (2.5 percent) and Rangers (2.7 percent).
If they can somehow work their way into the No. 3 spot in the Atlantic, and they’re only two points out of that, their path to the Eastern Conference finals is actually quite reasonable.
They’d have to beat Ottawa and then, likely, Montreal. Tampa Bay is a combined 4-2 against those two teams this season, and I’d feel comfortable picking them in a playoff series against either.
At that point, you get a team in the Eastern Conference finals that has to emerge from the Metro gauntlet. Oh yeah, somewhere in there Steven Stamkos returns to the lineup.
“We want to get in because we want to play for the Stanley Cup. That’s the bitter disappointment for us if we don’t,” Cooper said.
Suddenly, it’s all right there for the Lightning.