NHL teams at 10 (Tampa Bay)

October 30, 1:01 PMNHL ExaminerChris Morgan

Previous Next

Comment Print Email RSS Subscribe

Subscribe

Get alerts when there is a new article from the NHL Examiner. Read Examiner.com's terms of use.

Email Address   Include other special offers from Examiner.com Terms of Use

St. Louis has started off the season well. (Getty Images)

Only one new team joined the 10 games played party yesterday; the Tampa Bay Lightning. Well then, this should be simple enough.

Tampa Bay Lightning: 4-3-3, good for 11 points. After being terrible for two straight seasons it must be nice for Tampa to get off to a pretty good start. Plus, they are 4-0-2 at home, which is nice for the fans. However, they've let up more goals than they've scored thus far, which never bodes well. What does bode well, however, is Martin St. Louis and Steve Stamkos being tied for the team lead in points with 14. Slow start to his career last season for Stamkos, but he picked it up at the end of the year and he looks NHL ready now.

Some people are concerned that Vinny Lecavalier has only scored one goals thus far, but he has nine assists so I wouldn't be too worried. Plus, he is very good at hockey. He'll be fine. Alex Tanguay, however, is a bit more of a worry. He only has one goal and four points thus far. The Lightning could use a bit of secondary scoring. Ryan Malone is playing well (eight goals) and while I haven't seen him play I've heard good things about rookie Victor Hedman, which is promising. The goaltending situation is a bit iffy, with Mike Smith struggling. Perhaps they'll use Antero Niittymaki more. Couldn't hurt.

When you draft first overall and then second overall, you are going to add talent to your team. That's what has happened in Tampa Bay, and that's why this season will be better than the last two. Whether or not they can keep up the pace of their start is what remains to be seen.