Lightning move past sting of loss, ready to close out Stars in Game 6

The Tampa Bay Lightning are confident they'll rebound against the Dallas Stars in Game 6 of the Stanley Cup Final at Rogers Place in Edmonton on Monday (8 p.m. ET; NBC, CBC, SN, TVAS).

"The sting after a game, for both teams, whenever they lose, is usually that night. But the next day, I can only speak for our team, we've done a pretty good job of turning the page," coach Jon Cooper said Sunday about the 3-2 loss in double overtime in Game 5 in Edmonton, the hub city for the Cup Final, on Saturday.
"When you are that close, you can sit here and say you can taste it, but in the end, we're still up 3-2 in the series, and we feel pretty decent about our game, so let's bring it tomorrow night and see what happens."
The Lightning, who are looking to win the Cup for the first time since 2004, have reason to be confident; they're 5-0 in the Stanley Cup Playoffs in games that follow a loss. They also had a 3-1 series lead in the Eastern Conference Final against the New York Islanders when they lost 2-1 in double overtime in Game 5. They defeated the Islanders 2-1 in overtime in Game 6 to advance to the Cup Final.
Lightning center Yanni Gourde said it helps knowing they have been here and done this before.
"At the end of the day, that's what the playoffs are about. You're not going to win every time," he said. "We just have to go out there and play our best, try to win the next game and go from there. We've been in those situations before. We're going to go out there tomorrow, work hard and try to get the win."

The Lightning go into Game 6 of their best-of-7 series without forward Steven Stamkos, who Cooper said Sunday is out for the rest of the Cup Final. The captain scored a goal playing five shifts for 2:47 of a 5-2 victory in Game 3 on Wednesday. He did not play in Games 4 and 5.
As part of the NHL Return to Play Plan, a team is not permitted to disclose player injury or illness information.
Stamkos missed the first 21 postseason games with a lower-body injury sustained before training camp began July 13. He had not played since Feb. 25 and had surgery to repair a core muscle injury March 2, missing the final seven games before the season was paused March 12 due to concerns surrounding the coronavirus. He scored 66 points (29 goals, 37 assists) in 57 regular-season games, second on Tampa Bay to forward Nikita Kucherov's 85 points (33 goals, 52 assists) in 68 games.
"Hopefully the next time we see him on the ice is during a trophy presentation," Cooper said of Stamkos.
Defenseman Mikhail Sergachev gave the Lightning a 2-1 lead 3:38 into the third period of Game 5 on Saturday before Stars forward Joe Pavelski tied it 2-2 with 6:45 remaining. The Lightning outshot the Stars 7-2 in the first overtime before Dallas forward Corey Perry scored 9:23 into the second overtime for the win.
"I mean, it's not easy, especially when you make the Cup Final, the other team's backs against the wall, you're obviously going to get their best, their hardest push," Lightning forward Barclay Goodrow said. "I think from series one, two, three, four, that push from the team gets harder and harder. We knew it wasn't going to be easy. I think we have another gear we can get to tomorrow and hopefully we can get the job done."
The Lightning weren't dwelling on not being able to eliminate the Stars in five games.
"We can't rewrite history," Cooper said. "We can't go back and say, 'What if.' There were so many times in these playoffs that we were like, 'Holy cow, I can't believe we did that, or we did this.' So that's happened way more than second-guessing a missed shot or a post here. Let's just stay to our plan. It's gotten us this far."