The Backcheck: Recapping the finale of a winless road trip

The Tampa Bay Lightning concluded their three-game road trip Saturday night with a 7-4 loss to the Ottawa Senators at Canadian Tire Centre. It was a disappointing three games away from home for the Bolts, who finished the trip with a 0-3-0 record and surrendered 19 goals.

"We gave up 19 goals in three games," said Lightning head coach Jon Cooper following Saturday's loss. "We'd given up one in the previous three before that. It tells you what happens.
"One three-game stint you're 3-0, and one you're 0-3, so it was an extremely disappointing road trip."
It was a rough start for Tampa Bay on Saturday night with Ottawa opening the scoring just 30 seconds into the contest. Following an innocent dump-in by the Senators, the puck took a crazy ricochet off the corner boards and went straight to Erik Brannstrom, who fired a shot that got deflected by Drake Batherson and past Brian Elliott to make it 1-0.
The Lightning caught a break shortly after the game-opening goal when Artem Zub took a tripping penalty at the 1:23 mark of the first and sent the Bolts to the power play.
After some good chances were generated by the first power-play unit, Steven Stamkos collected the puck near the left circle, surveyed his options, wound up, and blasted a slap shot towards Cam Talbot that got redirected into the top left corner by Alex Killorn.
For Killorn, the goal moved him to 26 on the season, tying his career high set during the 2019-20 season.
But it seemed like every time the Lightning scored on Saturday, the Senators had an answer.
The first response came at the 10:57 mark of the period when Julien Gauthier beat Elliott to give Ottawa a 2-1 lead heading into the first intermission. Then it was Patrick Brown who extended the lead for the Senators when he scored 6:21 into the middle frame.
Following back-to-back penalties by Brannstrom and Claude Giroux, Tampa Bay earned a 5-on-3 power play and capitalized with Brandon Hagel jumping on a rebound, following a shot from Stamkos, to get the Bolts back within one.
With time remaining on the 5-on-4 power play, Victor Hedman hammered a one-timer past Talbot off a pass from Kucherov just 28 seconds later to tie the game at three.
But again, the Senators had an answer, this time coming in the form of a go-ahead goal from Alex DeBrincat, who scored with less than 20 seconds remaining in the second period to give his team a 4-3 lead going into the intermission.
The Lightning got bit by another early-period goal against when a turnover ended up on the stick of Egor Sokolov, who scored his first career goal to make it a 5-3 game only 2:07 into the final period.
Tampa Bay continued to look for ways to get back in the game and made it 5-4 with 13:59 remaining after Mikey Eyssimont sent a nice dish across the offensive zone to Hedman, who fired a pass to Brayden Point on the back door before he tapped in his 49th goal of the season as he continues the chase for his first career 50-goal campaign.
As the theme of the game continued, the Senators answered again with Mark Kastelic restoring the two-goal lead 4:48 later. Giroux went on to bury an empty-netter at the 19:41 mark to send Tampa Bay home with zero wins on the road trip.
"We're playing like the season ended when we clinched a playoff spot, like there was no season left," Cooper said. "I'm surprised. I've been with this group a long time.
"I'm extremely surprised that this is how it's happening."
Cooper is looking for a response from his team, particularly with the postseason right around the corner. The Bolts looked to be getting back on the right track prior to hitting the road with three consecutive victories by a combined score of 14-1.
Now, there are two games remaining for the team to get back to that winning style of play. As it's been stressed time and time again during the Cooper era, that is all going to start in the defensive zone. Surrendering six or seven goals a game isn't going to win games in the playoffs.
With just two games remaining in the regular season, Tampa Bay finished the campaign with an 18-22-1 record on the road and will begin their postseason journey following home games against Toronto on Tuesday and Detroit on Thursday.
"That will be nice," said Brayden Point when asked about finishing the season on home ice. "Obviously a tough trip here, so good to go back home and try to get some momentum off our home crowd. Just a better effort all around would be great."
It will be interesting to see how the Bolts respond to this latest adversity and perform on Tuesday.
The stage is set for Toronto-Tampa Bay in Round One. Tuesday's game means nothing in terms of standings as Toronto is already set to host Game One. But with that being said, is Tuesday's game an opportunity to gain some early confidence heading into the first game of the postseason?
"I think it means something," Point said. "I'm sure it does for them too. It's going to be our first-round matchup, so I would expect a tone to be set in that game from both sides, and hopefully our effort is better."
That's been the big word floating around after the past three losses - effort. It may not be easy to generate playoff-level effort when the games don't mean much in terms of the standings. But these games do matter in terms of gaining confidence and building momentum. Look for the Lightning to have that mindset on Tuesday.