It really was only a matter of time until the Tampa Bay Lightning would have to deal with the same situation that almost every other team in the league has had to deal with over the past month or so - losing players to COVID protocols. On Sunday night, the team announced that four players and assistant coach Rob Zettler entered COVID protocol prior to the team coming back together for their first post-Christmas practice.
Both goaltenders (Brian Elliott and Andrei Vasilevskiy), Mikhail Sergachev, and Pierre-Edouard Bellemare were held out of the practice which was led by assistant coach Derek Lalonde and featured coach Frantz Jean in net.