Lightning playoff streak ends, on ropes in Eastern Conference Final

NEW YORK -- If the Tampa Bay Lightning are going to win the Stanley Cup for a third consecutive season, they must overcome an adversity they never faced during their past two championship drives.

The Lightning are on the ropes following a
3-2 loss
to the New York Rangers in Game 2 of the Eastern Conference Final at Madison Square Garden on Friday. Having lost consecutive playoff games for the first time since 2019, Tampa Bay trails 2-0 in the best-of-7 series and heads home for Game 3 on Sunday (3 p.m. ET; ESPN, ESPN+, CBC, SN, TVAS) searching for a way to turn the momentum.
"At some point, you might lose two in a row in the playoffs," Lightning coach Jon Cooper said. "The fact that we haven't for how many years is remarkable. So you could take a second and say, 'Hell of a job, boys.' But for the most part, streaks do come to an end and unfortunately it came to an end tonight.
"Did it knock us out of the playoffs? It did not. Do we have a hill to climb? No question. … But I do think that we have better in us."
RELATED: [Complete Rangers vs. Lightning series coverage]
The Lightning had been 17-0 in playoff games following a loss since being swept by the Columbus Blue Jackets in the 2019 first round but found no rebound magic Friday against the Rangers, who used their speed and forecheck to repeatedly force turnovers that led to odd-man rushes and scoring chances.
"It was just puck management," Lightning defenseman Victor Hedman said. "It's one of those things that we need to be better at."
Building off a 6-2 win in Game 1 on Wednesday, New York shook off Nikita Kucherov's power-play goal that gave Tampa Bay a 1-0 lead 2:41 into the game and took control with goals from K'Andre Miller at 5:59 and Kaapo Kakko at 17:32 to lead 2-1 by the end of the first period.
The Rangers dominated much of the second period but couldn't build on their lead mostly because of goalie Andrei Vasilevskiy, who made 14 of his 25 saves in the middle period.
After a Kucherov turnover led to Mika Zibanejad's goal that increased the Rangers led to 3-1 at
1:21 of the third period, the Lightning finally began playing a more simple, straightforward game. That led to Tampa Bay generating more pressure in New York's end and eventually Nicholas Paul's 6-on-5 goal that made it 3-2 with 2:02 remaining.
But despite have a couple of late chances to tie the game, including a rebound shot from Steven Stamkos that Rangers goalie Igor Shesterkin stopped with 58 seconds left, the Lightning's late-game desperation wasn't enough.
"Just the urgency to win those battles and then keep our feet moving really turned the tables at the end," Paul said. "Obviously, not the result we wanted, but take that third period, remember it and just keep going from there."

The previous two seasons the Lightning found a way to play with urgency without losing two games in a row in the playoffs. That saved them from getting in predicaments like this one, needing to win four of the next five games to keep alive their quest to become the first team to win the Cup in three consecutive seasons since the New York Islanders won four straight championships from 1980-83.
"It's been a heck of a ride in terms of responding after losses in the past couple of years, so it shows the character of this group," Stamkos said. "It's the hardest trophy to win and you're going to come across some adverse moments, and this is certainly one of them."
Oddly, the Lightning are now looking to the Rangers for reasons to believe they can climb out of this hole. New York trailed the Pittsburgh Penguins 3-1 in the first round and the Carolina Hurricanes 2-0 in the second round and rallied to win each series.
"So the recipe is there," Stamkos said. "There's some of us who have been in those situations before in our careers and found a way to win a series … We get a chance to come back in front of our fans and let's start with next game and we'll go from there. But this is a resilient group, and we need to just get back to our identity."
That identity starts with playing with a defensive structure that suffocates and frustrates opponents at times. That's how the Lightning swept the Florida Panthers in the second round, limiting their high-powered offense to three total goals in the series.
The Lightning haven't been able to play close to that kind of defensive game through two games against the Rangers. If they can't do it in Game 3, it could be a short series.
Cooper said the Lightning aren't expecting forward Brayden Point, who led them in playoff goals the past two seasons and has been sidelined since Game 7 of the first round with a lower-body injury, "to miraculously come out for Game 3." So it's going to be up to the healthy players they have to turn the series around.
"The way we have to start a game is the way we played that third," forward Corey Perry said. "We got a little bit of momentum. We see what works and what doesn't, and you have to remember that going home. You got to win your games at home. They did that and we've got to go home and take care of business."