ANDREI VASILEVSKIY

Vasilevskiy Falls Short as Lightning Lose Grip at the Garden

Tampa out-shot and out-chanced New York, but the starter couldn’t keep the game within reach as the Bolts failed to finish quality chances.

Andrei Vasilevskiy had an uncharacteristic night in net when Tampa needed him to hold serve. The Lightning generated the better looks — 64 shot attempts to 52 and 21 high-danger chances to 17 — but couldn’t turn those opportunities into goals. Vasilevskiy finished with 20 saves on 24 shots, allowing 4 goals (save percentage 0.833). His expected goals against was 2.52, which shows the quality of chances he faced. Tampa matched New York with 25 shots on goal despite the attempts gap, a sign many chances missed the net or weren’t cleanly finished. Those missed finishes — rather than a lack of chance creation — left Vasilevskiy exposed and turned a favorable game script into a lopsided scoreline.