The Tampa Bay Lightning started the season by killing 28 consecutive penalties over parts of seven games. That streak ended on Sunday night when Chicago scored on the power play late in the third period.
Special teams are susceptible to misleading results because of the small sample sizes where streaky shooting or goaltending can make a team look terrible or great regardless of how they are playing. The Lightning’s streak raises the question of whether this was a stretch of excellent penalty killing or a run of good luck.
If you ask people who follow the Lightning closely to list the team’s primary weaknesses last season, many would point to the penalty kill.