Stadium Series in Tampa will go down as one of the best
While the NHL may have flooded the market, so to speak, with outdoor games ever since the resounding success of 2008’s inaugural Winter Classic in Buffalo, Sunday’s Stadium Series game between the Boston Bruins and Tampa Bay Lightning showed why the NHL keeps going back to the well. The Lightning skated away with a thriller, storming back from a 5-1 deficit to win 6-5 in the shootout.
It would have been a great game regardless of setting, but the fact Tampa Bay completed their stunning comeback under the sky at Raymond James Stadium, home of the NFL’s Tampa Bay Buccaneers, complete with the visuals and festivities that accompanied the event, made it that much more memorable. The Lightning are now 2-0 all time in outdoor games, as they defeated the Nashville Predators 3-2 in 2022’s Stadium Series game.
On Monday’s episode of Daily Faceoff LIVE, hosts Tyler Yaremchuk and former NHL goaltender Carter Hutton discussed what made Sunday’s outdoor game in Tampa so great.
Tyler Yaremchuk: How about the Stadium Series game that we got last night? I know a lot of people say the outdoor games are overplayed and all of that stuff, and I agree to a point. But that game last night may have just rejuvenated the outdoor game experience in the NHL. You had the Tampa Bay Lightning in their walk-in wearing full Tampa Bay Buccaneers uniforms. They basically all looked like punters and place kickers. I don’t think any of them are actually looking like they could step out onto a football field. You had the pirate theme thing. Jon Cooper’s outfit, he was weirdly dressed as Scarface.
I thought everything that went into it, and the pirate theme, all that was great, but then the game itself was unbelievable. When you’re dressed like Scarface, and you’re down 5-1, you probably feel like a bozo, but then Tampa Bay storms back, wins the game in a shootout, and Cooper’s walking off smoking a cigar in that outfit, everything last night was absolutely perfect.
Carter Hutton: It was perfect cinema last night. The Tampa Bay Lightning, the dynasty of a team that they’ve been, down like that, to be able to come back. Obviously the goalie fight was something that was so dramatic, and something that we’re going to have to get used to in the NHL. It feels like we get one every few weeks.
I’m sure it was a great game to be at. I had a chance to play in one at Busch Stadium. We ended up beating the Blackhawks, but it wasn’t to that extent. That was world class last night in a place that would not normally have outdoor hockey.
You can catch the full discussion and the rest of Monday’s episode here…