*Photo from the Columbus Dispatch*
What a night for young Elvis Merzlikins, and against one of the NHL's best teams too. Merzlikins stopped 37 shots, 3 different skaters scored, and the Columbus Blue Jackets topped the defending champion Tampa Bay Lightning by a 3-1 score on Tuesday night.
The scoring didn't start until 10:49 into the second period, when Oliver Bjorkstrand got the Blue Jackets on the board with his 13th goal of the season. With just 32 seconds left in the second, David Savard scored his first goal of the season to make it 2-0. 4:12 into the 3rd period, Mathieu Joseph got the Lightning on the board. But the Jackets got that goal right back with 1:31 left in the game on Cam Atkinson's 13th of the season, this one an empty netter.
Blue Jackets coach John Tortorella said of the win that "We were better, We're working on a way to play that will get us into some sort of identity. I think we took a step in the right direction. We struggled at times as far as some turnovers and allowing them to get on the attack. Elvis made some big saves for us. I think we did a pretty good job around the net after shots were taken. So yeah, we found a way to win a hockey game."
Merzlikins had a strong outing, continuing his strong second season, stopping 37 of 38 shots that came his way. The win also snapped Columbus's losing streak at 4 games. His record bumped up to 6-5-2 this season, while Columbus has a 14-15-8 record, 6th in the Central Division.
Merzlikins said of the win that "These kinds of games are going to help me go where I want to go, which is up. We played much better. Like I said before, I think the great thing with the day off after the bad weekend was that we could clear our mind and change our mentality right away. But this is only one game. We haven't won anything. We have to keep focusing."
Curtis McElhinney started in net for the Lightning, getting hit with the loss this time around. McElhinney stopped 18 shots out of the 20 that came his way in the defeat. McElhinney's record dropped to 3-4-1 in limited action this season, while the Lightning hold on to first in the Central with a 24-9-2 record.
Lightning coach Jon Cooper said of the loss that "If there was one issue to our game it's that we let the goalie see everything. We were doing a lot of good things. The process was fine, we had our legs. We just didn't take eyes away. We had our looks, just tonight they didn't go in."
The Lightning and Blue Jackets face off again Thursday night in Tampa Bay, with Joonas Korpisalo starting for the Jackets, and Andrei Vasilevskiy starting for the Lightning.
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