The Olympic afterglow is bound to be burning when the Tampa Bay Lightning face the Carolina Hurricanes on Thursday night in Raleigh, N.C.
It will be the first game since the Olympic break for the Hurricanes, who had several players participating in the Milan Cortina Games in Italy and three medalists.
Tampa Bay also has an Olympic shine: forward Jake Guentzel, who briefly played for Carolina and was a member of the United States’ gold-medal team, and coach Jon Cooper, who guided Canada to the silver medal. Yet Cooper isn’t back with the Lightning because of the death of his father.
The team resumed its season with Wednesday night’s 4-2 home victory against the Toronto Maple Leafs. Assistant coach Rob Zettler is serving as acting coach for
Tampa Bay, which holds a six-game winning streak.
“I am really confident in our guys,” Zettler said. “They’ve been excellent in so many ways this year, including times like this where Coop’s missing or something happens to one of the guys, and we’ve had guys step up all year.”
Hurricanes defenseman Jaccob Slavin returned from Italy with a gold medal and motivation to add a Stanley Cup to his resume.
“Now it’s like, I want to come back here and do it with these guys, the ‘Canes,” Slavin said. “And be able to win a Cup with them — the guys you battle with all year long.”
The Lightning and Hurricanes entered the break with the two best records in the Eastern Conference.
Then Tampa Bay got even better, with Brayden Point in the lineup Wednesday for the first time since Jan. 12. Zettler said Point, who provided two goals and an assist, was “pumped, as you can imagine.”
The Hurricanes will look for similar production as they return to the ice.
“We’ve got to continue to play well,” Hurricanes coach Rod Brind’Amour said. “Everybody is so tight (in the standings).”
Brind’Amour said Slavin, along with forwards Seth Jarvis (silver medal, Canada) and Sebastian Aho (bronze medal, Finland), should be available for Thursday night’s game.
The Hurricanes are anticipating the possible return to the lineup of forward Eric Robinson, who resumed on-ice workouts during the past week amid an upper-body injury.
Now it’s a matter of regenerating the energy for the regular season. Carolina has three wins in a row as part of its current 10-game points streak (8-0-2).
“That’s the biggest concern,” Brind’Amour said. “Just getting ramped up again and getting at that pace that we were playing at, which was pretty good. … Everybody is in the same boat. They’ll have a game under their belt, which that’s probably a benefit.”
Carolina goalie Brandon Bussi is expected to start on Thursday. The rookie holds a 23-3-1 record.
The Hurricanes have 25 games in the next 48 days to complete the regular season.
“It’s a lot of hockey,” Brind’Amour said. “Yeah, it’s a short period of time. But six weeks, so you’re playing a quarter of the season. There’s so much going on here that can change.”
Since mid-December, the Lightning have played games on back-to-back days only twice and now will get a taste of that right away coming out of the break.
Tampa Bay defeated visiting Carolina 6-4 on Dec. 20. Thursday will be their second meeting of the season, and the teams will face off again on March 14.
