Monday, 21 September 2020

Momentum can change quickly in Stanley Cup final

Stars, Lightning all even at 1-1

A Nikita Kucherov card.
Old “Mo” seems to really fickle so far in the Stanley Cup final.

In the NHL’s best-of-seven championship series between the Dallas Stars and the Tampa Bay Lightning being played at Rogers Place in the bubble city of Edmonton, momentum seems to enjoy jumping from side to side in the first two games of the set.

The series is tied 1-1 after the Stars took Game 1 by a 4-1 final on Saturday and the Lightning rebounded with a 3-2 victory in Game 2 on Monday.

Game 3 of the series is set for Wednesday (6 p.m. Saskatchewan time, CBC and NBCSN).

The Stars 4-1 triumph in Game 1 was a solid one, but it appeared Tampa Bay might be able to rally in the third. Entering the third period trailing 3-1, the Lightning had a 22-2 edge in shots on goal in the frame as they pressed to get back in that game.

Stars centre Jason Dickinson sealed that contest with an empty-net goal with 78 seconds remaining in the third.

In Game 2 on Monday, both teams played a quiet opening 10 minutes before the Lightning exploded for three goals to take a 3-0 lead into the first intermission.

A John Klingberg card.
At the 11:23 mark of the first, elite Lightning right-winger Nikita Kucherov set up standout centre Brayden Point, who quickly wired home a power-play goal to go up 1-0.

After that tally, Kucherov proceeded to set up left-winger Ondrej Palat on a backdoor feed, and Palat potted his team’s second power-play goal of the contest to give the Lightning a 2-0 edge at the 14:22 mark of the opening frame.

Lightning skilled offensive-defenceman Victor Hedman also had assists on both of those first two goals.

Just 54 seconds later, solid defender Kevin Shattenkirk slid home the Lightning’s third goal from the point through a screen to increase Tampa Bay’s advantage to 3-0.

On top of holding a 3-0 lead, the Lightning held a 14-6 edge in shots on goal after 20 minutes, and it looked like they were going to roll like an unstoppable freight train.

Despite Tampa Bay’s great start, Dallas controlled the second period holding an 18-5 edge in shots on goal.

At the 14:43 mark of the second, the Stars gained some traction, when centre Joe Pavelski tipped home a point shot from defenceman John Klingberg for a power-play goal to cut the Tampa Bay lead to 3-1.

An Ondrej Palat card.
At the 5:27 mark of the third, Klingberg pinched into the Lightning zone and fed a backdoor feed to centre Mattias Janmark, who tapped the puck into the Tampa Bay goal to cut the Lightning lead to 3-2.

Right-winger Alexander Radulov had assists on both Stars goals.

Tampa Bay appeared to go ahead 4-2 near the midway point of the third on a goal by defenceman Mikhail Sergachev. The goal was disallowed after Dallas challenged that the play was offside via video review and the video review confirmed the play was indeed offside.

While the Lightning held a 12-5 edge in shots on goal in the third, the Stars chances to get the game to overtime.

With a minute remaining in the third, Stars veteran left-winger Jamie Benn was stopped from point-blank range in front of the Tampa Bay goal by Lightning netminder Andrei Vasilevskiy.

The Stars also had an offensive zone faceoff with 3.8 seconds remaining in the third, but Klingberg fanned on one final shot, which was ultimately blocked by a Lightning skater.

Vasilevskiy made 27 stops to pick up the win in goal for the Lightning. Anton Khudobin turned away 28 shots to take the setback in goal for the Stars.

An Alexander Radulov card.
Game 2 was a great one and the goalies on either side couldn’t be faulted for any of the five goals that were scored in the contest. All five goals were really good goals.

With the way the momentum has swung, credit has to go to Stars head coach Rick Bowness and Lightning head coach Jon Cooper for the adjustments they’ve made on the fly.

Wednesday’s upcoming Game 3 might be a big swing game. 

The team that falls in that contest will face more pressure than usual to win in Game 4 on Friday, because Game 5 follows up quickly one day later.

If either team falls behind 3-1 in the series, it might be hard to recover and win Game 5 with no off day between that contest and Game 4.

So far, the Stars and Lightning are giving a series that is well worth tuning for. 

Expect the momentum swings to continue as the Stanley Cup final goes on.

Massive outpouring for Ashe showed he was well loved

Dylan Ashe. (Photo courtesy Della Ashe)
The cliché that the good guys leave this world too early unfortunately played out this past weekend.

Early Sunday morning, 18-year-old Melfort Mustangs junior A team defenceman Dylan Ashe died in a single vehicle rollover on Highway 35 northeast of White Fox, Sask. Ashe was driving one of his family’s cars as his beloved 1984 Chevy truck parked for some repairs.

For anyone who has links to Saskatchewan’s hockey community, you knew that the news of Ashe’s passing was going to hit a lot of people hard. He was really well loved in Saskatchewan’s hockey community and in the hockey community of Lethbridge, Alta., as he was a prospects of the WHL’s Lethbridge Hurricanes.

Della Ashe, Dylan’s mom, broke the news of her son’s passing on a Facebook post on Sunday afternoon. Dylan had been driving out the lake country for a quick visit before returning home. He was planning to travel to Melfort on Tuesday to rejoin the Mustangs.

Since the creation of Della’s post, support and condolences messages have poured in for the family that is based out of Warman, Sask.

Numerous media outlets in Saskatchewan have produced tribute stories for Dylan Ashe.

Ashe played for the Sask Valley Vipers under-15 AA team in 2016-17 before splitting time in 2017-18 with his hometown Warman Wildcats under-18 AA team and the Tisdale Trojans under-18 AAA club.

He played for the Trojans for the entire 2018-19 campaign outside of a one-game call up with the Mustangs for an SJHL regular season contest. Ashe helped the Trojans win a bronze medal at the Telus Cup.

Ashe, who stood 6-foot-1 and weighed 185 pounds, was never selected in the WHL Bantam Draft, but he still signed a WHL Standard Player Agreement with the Hurricanes on April 10, 2019. He had a strong showing in training camp with the Hurricanes prior to the 2019-20 campaign before joining the Mustangs.

With the Mustangs last season, Ashe had two goals and four assists in 46 regular season games.

On the ice, Ashe was known as a tough stay at home defensive defenceman. He was also a quiet but upbeat great character guy. He could walk into a room, flash his smile and the positive energy would go up.

The Trojans, Mustangs and Hurricanes have all passed on messages of condolence.

Della and her husband, Mike, have received numerous messages about how great of a person Dylan was.

Dylan cared a lot for his family, and he enjoyed hanging out with older sister Jordan, who was a tough as nails defensive defender with the Prince Albert Northern Bears female under-18 AAA hockey team from 2013 to 2018.

Dylan Ashe just graduated from high school this past June. He got to parade in his 1984 Chevy truck through the Wyant Group Raceway with Warman High School grad class. The track hosted the unique graduation ceremony as the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic restrictions placed limits on regular graduation activities.

Ashe spent countless hours working on and refurbishing his 1984 Chevy truck.

His passing at age 18 and about two-and-a-half months since his high school graduation is a reminder of how life can be unfair. He should have been able to live out a rich array of experiences.

Over the next handful of years, he seemed ready to live out a few more of his hockey dreams.

Still, he was able to make a lot of people care about him for the years that he was here. The outpouring of emotions and messages since his passing is proof of that.

A GoFundMe campaign that was started on Sunday to help the Ashe family with funeral expenses has raised over triple its initial goal by late Monday night.

Dylan Ashe lived life on his own terms, and it was a well lived one.

If you have any comments you would like to pass along about this post, feel free to email them to stankssports@gmail.com. If you would like to donate to the GoFundMe campaign to help the Ashe family with funeral expenses, you can do so by clicking right here.

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