The Tampa Bay Lightning are clearly not interested in repeating their misstep of last season as they welcome the Toronto Maple Leafs to Amalie Arena on Tuesday night. Still dogged by last year’s stunning first-round playoff upset at the hands of Columbus, the Lightning made a trio of significant moves at Monday’s trade deadline to shore up their already-solid lineup.
- Date/Time: February 25, 7 p.m. ET
- Arena: Amalie Arena
- TV Coverage: SNO, SUN
- Sportsbook Odds: Lightning -188 | O/U 6.5
- Maple Leafs vs Lightning Matchup Report
Sportsbook Odds Analysis
The Lightning opened as -188 home favorites and can be found anywhere from -180 to -190 at present. The total kicked off at 6.5 but has actually climbed to the lofty magic number of 7 in some spots.
Toronto News & Notes
For a team still fighting for a spot in the Stanley Cup playoffs, the Maple Leafs were surprisingly quiet at Monday’s deadline, making a handful of minor moves but failing to upgrade any of their weak spots. Of course, their big acquisition came earlier in the month, when they acquired netminder Jack Campbell and forward Kyle Clifford from the Los Angeles Kings.
But getting to the postseason will take more than nabbing a backup goalie and a bottom-six winger. And the upcoming schedule offers little relief for the Maple Leafs, with five of their next six games coming on the road. And they still have three games (Tuesday included) against a Lightning team that owns the second-best record in the NHL coming into this one.
Tampa Bay News & Notes
Not only do the Lightning boast a 10-game home winning streak entering Tuesday, they also have a much better roster than they did to start the week. Tampa Bay was clearly one of the league’s trade deadline Sportsbooks, acquiring 20-goal scorer Blake Coleman, defensive specialist Barclay Goodrow and veteran blue-liner Zach Bogosian without giving up anything of consequence.
But while the Lightning will have no trouble maintaining their league-best scoring pace (3.53 goals per game), they’ll need to put in some serious work on the back end if they hope to finally catch Boston atop the Atlantic Division. The Lightning have lost two in a row following an 11-game winning streak, and surrendered 12 goals in those defeats to Vegas and Arizona.
Betting Pick: OVER 6.5
The O7 leaves bettors susceptible to a push – so find a slightly lower number (or buy it if you can), and take the OVER on that. Toronto and Tampa Bay rank 1-2 in the league in goals, so there will be offense here.
- Toronto is 1-6 SU in its last 7 games vs Tampa Bay.
- Tampa Bay is 10-0 SU in its past 10 home games.
- The UNDER is 9-3 in the last 12 games between the teams at Tampa.
