The Tampa Bay Lightning showed everyone why they are the defending Stanley Cup Champions on Monday night when they trounced the New York Islanders 8-0.
With the series being tied 2-2 heading into Game 5, people began to believe that the Islanders had a chance to pull off the series upset. Those dreams were dashed quickly, as the Lightning took the game over from the opening puck drop, and didn’t stop until the final whistle.
Final ? from tonight's win! #TBLvsNYI pic.twitter.com/fMI6YK0I1I
— Tampa Bay Lightning (@TBLightning) June 22, 2021
Oddsmakers have responded to the demolition appropriately, as the Lightning are now massive -650 (bet $650 to profit $100) favorites to win the series and advance to the Stanley Cup Finals for the third time in seven years. They’ve also taken of as the betting favorites to win it all, as WynnBET has them set atop the oddslist at +100 odds. The Vegas Golden Knights are next on the list at +155, followed by the Montreal Canadiens at +800 and then finally the Islanders at +1000.
As is the case with many dark horse teams that make a run in the Stanley Cup playoffs, the Islanders goaltending had carried them through the postseason until this point. The Lightning are the first time to figure out Semyon Varlamov, as the Islanders sport a team save percentage of 89.44% in their semifinal series.
To make matters worse for New York, Andrei Vasilevskiy has been lights out for Tampa Bay. He sports a 2.05 goals against average in the playoffs and a .936 save percentage, both are the best marks among the remaining goalies in the postseason.
If Vasilevskiy doesn’t manage to win the Conn Smythe trophy for MVP of the playoffs, that award will certainly go to Nikita Kucherov who leads the postseason with 27 points, nine more than the next closest on the stat sheet.
Kucherov missed the entire season due to an injury, but hasn’t missed a beat since returning to the team for the playoffs.
The Lightning have taken over as the Stanley Cup favorites, but if the Knights can get past the Canadiens, we’ll be in for one heck of a final series.