With Tampa Bay Lightning training camp less than a month away, players have started trickling into the Bolts' practice facility at the Ice Sports Forum for voluntary, informal workouts.

Nikita Kucherov was the first to arrive - he never really left -- working on the ice with former 2004 Stanley Cup champion and skills instructor Dmitry Afanasenkov and joined last week by goaltender Andrei Vasilevskiy.

Defensemen Braydon Coburn and Dan Girardi accompanied the group on Monday. Ryan Callahan had an off-ice session at the Ice Sports Forum Tuesday before getting on the ice Wednesday.

Yes, you read that correctly.

During the offseason, tampabaylightning.com will talk to Lightning players to get their first-hand account of a moment from the 2017-18 season, an update on their summer or just what's on their mind currently.

Today, we chat with Andrei Vasilevskiy, who returned to Tampa a couple weeks ago to begin informal workouts at the Ice Sports Forum. Vasilevskiy set a number of Lightning records - most wins (44), most saves (1,908), most shutouts (8), and most consecutive victories (9) - and was a Vezina finalist during the 2017-18 campaign in leading Tampa Bay to the Eastern Conference Final. Here, the 24-year-old goalie recaps the summer in his homeland, what it was like in Russia for the World Cup and how, even after all these years, Guns N' Roses can still rock out with the best of them, as told to tampabaylightning.com beat writer Bryan Burns.

TAMPA BAY - The Tampa Bay Lightning have entered into a three-year affiliation agreement with the Orlando Solar Bears of the ECHL, vice president and general manager Steve Yzerman announced today. The Solar Bears will serve as the Lightning's primary ECHL affiliate starting with the 2018-19 season. The Lightning will play a preseason game against the Florida Panthers at Amway Center in Orlando on Thursday, September 27. Tickets for the game will go on sale to the general public on Thursday, August 23 at 10 a.m. at Ticketmaster.com.

NBC Sports is scheduled to present 109 NHL regular-season games during the 2018-19 season - its most since acquiring NHL rights prior to the 2005-06 season. Coverage begins Wednesday, Oct. 3, at 7:30 p.m. ET on NBCSN, when Alex Ovechkin and the Stanley Cup champion Washington Capitals raise their championship banner to the rafters and host the Boston Bruins. All games will be streamed live on NBCSports.com and the NBC Sports app to authenticated users via TV Everywhere.

OLDSMAR, FL - During their August 7, 2018 meeting, Oldsmar City Council voted unanimously to approve a Cooperation and License Agreement with the Tampa Bay Lightning Foundation, Inc. to build an outdoor roller/street hockey rink. The future rink will be inside the Oldsmar Sports Complex, located at 3120 Tampa Road, and is the first 'Lightning Made' site in Pinellas County.

During the offseason, tampabaylightning.com will talk to Lightning players to get their first-hand account of a moment from the 2017-18 season, an update on their offseason or just what's on their mind currently.

Today, we catch up with Anthony Cirelli, who made his NHL debut March 1 in Dallas and recorded a goal and an assist against the Stars, becoming one of just four Tampa Bay Lightning players all time to notch two points in his first NHL game. The center was a mainstay in the Bolts lineup going forward, playing the final 18 games of the regular season and every postseason contest in the Lightning's run to the Eastern Conference Final.

"We threw him in there with 20-something games to go in the regular season, and he's going head-to-head against Nick Backstrom and (Evgeny) Kuznetsov and Jay Beagle - really, really good NHL centermen - and holding his own," Lightning general manager Steve Yzerman said of Cirelli during his 2017-18 season exit interview.

Now in Ontario training for 2018-19, Cirelli took time to reminisce about what it was like once he got word he was moving up to the NHL, the nerves he felt before making his League debut and how he managed to score a goal in his first game, as told to tampabaylightning.com's Bryan Burns.

During the offseason, tampabaylightning.com will talk to Lightning players to get their first-hand account of a moment from the 2017-18 season, an update on their summer or just what's on their mind currently.

Today, we talk to Yanni Gourde, who had to balance playing in the Stanley Cup Playoffs with becoming, along with his wife Marie-Andree, a first-time parent. Gourde scored a goal in Game 2 of an Eastern Conference Semifinals win versus Boston, was at the hospital to witness the birth of his daughter Emma Kate Gourde and flew to Boston for a pivotal Game 3, all in a 48-hour period and with only a couple hours of sleep.

Here, Gourde recounts those dizzying couple of days, as told to tampabaylightning.com beat writer Bryan Burns.

TAMPA BAY - Single game tickets for all Tampa Bay Lightning games at AMALIE Arena during the 2018 preseason and 2018-19 regular season, presented by Florida Hospital, will go on sale at 10 a.m. on Friday, August 10, the team announced today. Single game tickets can be purchased exclusively online at www.TampaBayLightning.com/tickets.   

EDINA, Minn. -- Ryan McDonagh will be happy to see a lot of familiar faces when he reports to training camp for the Tampa Bay Lightning in September.

Jeff Halpern was hired as an assistant on Jon Cooper's Tampa Bay Lightning staff on the opening day of the 2018 Draft, completing an expeditious circuit from near-1,000 game NHL player to burgeoning coach toiling in the American League and back to the NHL behind the bench.

Halpern hung up his playing skates in 2014 in Phoenix following his 14th season in the NHL, three of which came with the Lightning from 2007 to 2010, and the undrafted forward from Princeton accumulated 26 goals, 25 assists and 51 points through his stops in Washington, Dallas, Tampa Bay, Los Angeles, Montreal, the New York Rangers and Phoenix. Halpern returned to the Lightning organization for the 2015-16 season as a player development coach and was hired as a full-time assistant coach with the Syracuse Crunch in 2016-17, a season in which the Crunch advanced to the Calder Cup Finals.

Halpern is one of two new assistants joining Cooper's staff along with former Iowa Wild head coach Derek Lalonde. On Monday, Halpern took time to chat over the phone from Syracuse with TampaBayLightning.com's Bryan Burns about returning to the NHL as a coach, his role on the Lightning staff and whether he ever dreams of a comeback as a player.