Win spells loss for Lightning

Chris Gratton wins a faceoff but the speeding puck careens off Paul Mara's skate and into the Tampa Bay net for Boston's clinching goal.

By TOM JONES

© St. Petersburg Times, published January 21, 2000

TAMPA -- Someday, Lightning coach Steve Ludzik will look back on these days and laugh.

Someday, he'll shake his head and chuckle about how players shot pucks in their own nets. How his power play looked helpless against even the worst penalty-killing unit in hockey. How his team couldn't buy a win at home against struggling opponents.

Someday, it all will seem funny.

Today is not that day.

See, all those things that will be funny one day happened Thursday night as the Lightning lost. Again. The Bruins knocked off the Lightning 4-2 before an announced crowd of 11,418 at the Ice Palace.

The Lightning put a puck in its own net. It couldn't do a thing in three chances against a Bruins penalty-killing unit that is the worst in the NHL. And Boston had won only twice in its past 14 games -- and those wins were against the worst teams in hockey (the Islanders and Thrashers).

"I think I need to go to church and light some candles," Ludzik said.

The epitome of the game, of the recent woes, of the season, heck, of pretty much the entire Lightning history was wrapped in one freaky play midway through the third period.

The Lightning wasn't playing well, but it wasn't playing poorly either. It trailed by only a goal, and had a chance to actually win -- something it has done only once since Dec. 10.

It was down 2-1 with the faceoff in the Lightning end. Tampa Bay's Chris Gratton won the faceoff. He fired the puck behind him, as he is supposed to. Defenseman Paul Mara was in front of the Lightning goal, as he was supposed to be. Goalie Kevin Hodson was ready, as he was supposed to be.

So what happened? The puck deflected wickedly off Mara's skate and into the net.

"That's a one-in-a-million play," Gratton said.

"Bad, bad luck," Mara said.

Assistant coach John Cullen said he never had seen anything like in 30 years of organized hockey.

It figures. The Lightning sets precedent and it was the other team's game-winning goal.

The Lightning didn't quit. It added a goal with 1:30 left to make it 3-2, but by then it was too late. Former Lightning Rob DiMaio added an empty-net goal.

"It's another loss," Gratton said, "and I don't find anything positive out of a loss."

There were positives, but even those went wasted.

Hodson, who has spent most of the past month residing in the Ludzik's doghouse, crawled out to give a steady 26-save performance. No bad goals. Several good saves. He did what the Lightning needed. He gave it a chance to win.

Yogi Svejkovsky, acquired in a trade with Washington on Monday, scored both goals in his Lightning debut. They were his first since opening night.

The defense, the subject of most of the blame this season, played well. Like Hodson, it gave the Lightning a chance.

With all the chances to win, though, the Lightning couldn't and lost for the 12th time (including overtime losses) in 14 games.

Hodson refused comment after the game, but Ludzik said, "I thought Hodson played really well, and that was good to see."

Boston's Joe Thornton, who scored a goal to go along with Marty McSorley's first of the season, said: "He made the key saves for them and played a good game."

Still, the Lightning allowed two goals or more for the 24th straight game.

"Yeah, we're getting a lot of bad breaks, but you have to step up and come back from them," defenseman Pavel Kubina said. "When you get a bad break, you just have to work that much harder."

"This was a crazy game," Ludzik said. "One goal goes in off a knee of one of our players. Another goes in off the faceoff. ... We have got to start getting breaks like that. But to do that, you have to work hard and make your own breaks. I don't know what else to say."

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