Burns: 3 Things we learned from just falling short in Game 4

Tampa Bay nearly completed one of the most incredible comebacks in its playoff history, the Lightning rallying from a three-goal deficit entering the third period with two goals and had the tying goal on Ryan McDonagh's stick in the dying seconds.
But Ryan Pulock made the play of the series so far, diving in front of the Islanders empty net and blocking McDonagh's shot away at the final buzzer to preserve the 3-2 victory for the Isles in Game 4.
The best-of-seven Stanley Cup Semifinal now sits at two games apiece as the teams head back to Tampa for Game 5 Monday night at AMALIE Arena.
Tampa Bay made the game a lot closer than it appeared it would be after the second period, when the Islanders scored three goals to take control of the contest.
The Lightning weren't going to go down without a fight.

Brayden Point ignited the comeback with a quick snap shot from the top of the right circle to give him a goal in seven-straight games. Only one player in NHL history has recorded a longer playoff goal streak (Reggie Leach with goals in 10-consecutive games in 1976).
The Lightning continued pressuring and got within one with Tyler Johnson's snipe from the left circle over the glove of Semyon Varlamov to make it 3-2 with more than 13 minutes still left to be played.
That tying goal never came. Victor Hedman was whistled for a ticky-tack tripping penalty with 1:12 to go, severely hampering the Bolts' chances. But Nikita Kucherov was still able to thread a pass at 5-on-5 with Andrei Vasilevskiy pulled into the left circle for a wide-open Ryan McDonagh and seconds to go.
Pulock's prescient play denied the Lightning their miraculous comeback.
Tampa Bay's four-game road win streak came to an end Saturday night, and the Lightning fell for the first time in the playoffs to the Islanders at Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum, dropping to 3-1 all-time.
The Semifinal series now becomes a best-of-three, with two of the final three games being played at AMALIE Arena, starting with Monday's Game 5.

1. THE FINAL PLAY
It seemed like the Lightning's comeback bid was going to fall just short when Victor Hedman was called for a dubious tripping penalty against Cal Clutterbuck as the two were racing for a loose puck in the Lightning zone, Hedman's stick getting a piece of Clutterbuck's skate but the burly defenseman going down rather easily to draw the call.
With a power play to close out the game, the Islanders won the face-off and wasted about 30 seconds just sending the puck around the perimeter with no intention of shooting.
But the Lightning were finally able to get the puck out of their zone and into the Islanders zone, enabling Andrei Vasilevskiy to leave his next and even things up 5-on-5.
With 13 seconds remaining, the Lightning had one final push. A puck was dumped into the zone. The Islanders tried to rim it around the wall but Ondrej Palat cut it off at the half wall with six seconds, sending it back down low for Nikita Kucherov.
From nearly behind the net, Kucherov threaded a pass to the top of the left circle, where Ryan McDonagh was waiting all alone with a clear shooting lane at the net.
McDonagh moved into the circle, did a spin move to elude a diving Brock Nelson and had Islanders goalie Semyon Varlamov beat as Varlamov came out to cut off the angle and was fooled by the spin-o-rama.
McDonagh lifted a backhanded shot at the open net with three seconds left.
It would have been maybe the most incredible goal in Lightning history.
Instead, Ryan Pulock saved the day for the Islanders, going down to his knees in the open crease, the puck hitting his stick, bouncing up into his chest and Pulock ushering the rebound away from the net with his hand to preserve the victory for the Islanders.
"Kuch made a heck of a deflection pass to get it up to me," McDonagh said. "I just tried to get something on net. Great play by their defenseman. Desperation and he comes up with a huge block."
Tyler Johnson, sitting on the bench on the play, said the team was "antsy with anticipation" as the final play was unfolding.
"I think everyone thought it was going to go in," Johnson said. "Credit to them, they made a great save, was able to get it. Obviously, we're disappointed in that, but we don't want to be in that situation anyways."
There were three incredible plays in the late-game drama. Kucherov beat Adam Pelech to Palat's pass behind the net and was able to get it to McDonagh even though it was deflected by Pelech.
McDonagh had the presence of mind to spin to get past Nelson and pull Varlamov out of position. And, of course, Pelech's wherewithal to get into the open goal and block the potential game-tying shot away is the play of the series so far, maybe the play of the playoffs.
"Desperation play by their defenseman, but to be honest, I thought the play McDonagh made was better than the save," Lightning head coach Jon Cooper said. "It was hard for McDonagh to get that up. Just to get the puck on the net was a phenomenal play both by Kuch and Mac. But give their guy credit, they were desperate, and he came in and made that save. Probably made for some pretty exciting TV, I'll tell you that. But, yeah, that was a bit of a heart stopper at the end. Unfortunately, it didn't go our way."

2. THE THIRD PERIOD PUSH
The Lightning were vastly outplayed in the second period and seemed to be dead in the water as the Islanders had all the momentum and a 3-0 lead heading into the final frame.
Tampa Bay wasn't finished, however.
Not by a long shot.
The Bolts fortunes started to change when Brayden Point decided to take on the entire Islanders defense by himself. With none of his teammates around and surrounded by five Islanders, Point carried the puck into the offensive zone, cut slightly to the top of the right circle and snapped a quick strike, beating Varlamov to the stick side to get the Lightning on the board and cut the deficit to two goals.
Point now has 12 goals this postseason, four more than any other NHL player. He's attempting to finish as the NHL's playoff goal leader for a second-straight postseason.
He scored in his seventh-consecutive game and has a goal in nine of the last 10 contests.
That goal gave the Lightning a much-needed lift and seemed to energize them.
"We basically just said in between that period we have to give it our all and see what happens," Tyler Johnson said. "Pointer goes out there and scores a big goal, gets us a lot of momentum. We just kept on going. We got close, but you never really want to be in that situation."
Less than three minutes later, Tyler Johnson finished off a sustained push of heavy pressure by the Lightning with a goal to make it 3-2.
The play was set up by Kucherov, who got the puck in the offensive zone, surveyed his options and spotted Johnson trailing the play coming down the slot. Johnson's initial attempt was blocked by Varlamov, but he chased down the rebound behind the net. With room in the left circle, Johnson cut toward goal to get away from Josh Bailey and get wide open. When he was nearly to the hash marks, he unleashed a wicked shot to beat Varlamov to the glove side.
"We played more desperate in the third, but that's what happens when you're down 3-0," Victor Hedman said. "We've just got to make sure we can do that from the start."
Now trailing by only a goal, the Lightning had over 13 minutes to try to tie the contest.
But they fell just a bit short, their three-goal deficit proving too large to overcome.

3. A RED ROTTEN SECOND PERIOD
When the Lightning look back at the video from Game 4, they'll want to burn the images from the second period.
Tampa Bay was completely outplayed in the middle frame, and it's there where the game was lost.
The Islanders scored three times in the second and truthfully could have scored more the way they were pushing. The Lightning were defending for most of the period because they couldn't gain possession of the puck or take it away from the Islanders. And when they did finally get possession, they would immediately turn it back over to the Islanders, fueling their transition.
"We didn't execute," Hedman said. "They were the better team. You give up three goals in a period, it's not good enough. We pushed in the third but shouldn't be in that position to start with and we know that."
Josh Bailey started the onslaught with his shot from the right circle at 5:30.
Mathew Barzal cleaned up a rebound to make it 2-0 Islanders at 13:46 of the second.
And a couple minutes later, Matt Martin backhander a rebound in from the right side for a three-goal New York advantage, sending the Coliseum into delirium.
"That doesn't happen to us too often," Cooper said. "It was red rotten that second period. These guys have given it their all for whatever it's been now, a month and change. Sometimes you lay an egg and we laid one in the second period. It was unfortunate because, you don't play well sometimes the breaks don't go your way. We turn one over on the first one. Second one, Pointer loses his stick, which that was really unfortunate or that one probably doesn't go in. And then we just turned it over way too many times on the third one. You realize how precious every period is and every shift is. It's one of those, if you do bend, you can't break, and that second period we broke."
The Lightning tried to challenge the third goal, thinking the play might have been offside. Video review confirmed the goal was good.
Cooper stood incredulously on the ice after the period was over, his arms outstretched, pleading with the officials. McDonagh, Hedman and Steven Stamkos surrounded the officials to make their case on why the goal shouldn't have stood.
Turns out, the Lightning didn't have all of the resources they normally would when they made the challenge.
"There were a couple problems," Cooper said. "First of all, the hawkeye went out on the bench. So we have zero chance for us to look at it. The other thing is you're getting your feeds from the network. And so they're sitting there showing, they're in the entertainment business. They're not showing all the angles that need to be shown. So we're now relying on limited intel and if you really look at the play, your gut and everything is telling you it's offside. And then once the challenge is made, like way after the fact, we get into the room and then they finally show an angle at the end which took them forever to show, we saw that Bailey or whoever had the puck, he pulled it on just by a fraction of an inch and then off. So from our vantage point, even on the angles we had on the bench, everything looked offside. And that's the unfortunate part is we didn't get all the angles and so that can be a little bit frustrating because we had to go a little bit on gut on what shouldn't ever have to be a gut call. It's a black and white call."