The Tampa Bay Lightning have an opportunity to close out the Columbus Blue Jackets on Wednesday at noon EST.
Last year, the Columbus Blue Jackets swept the Tampa Bay Lightning. This year, the Bolts have an opportunity to get some revenge by knocking the Jackets out of the Stanley Cup Playoffs. Tampa has a 3-1 lead in their first round series against Columbus and on Wednesday, Aug. 19, starting at noon EST, they’ll get the opportunity to return the favor from last season.
Each game in this series has been close. But Tampa’s been the better team. If it wasn’t for Blue Jackets goaltender Joonas Korpisalo, this series would already likely be over in favor of Tampa. Columbus played their best game of the series in Game 4 and still couldn’t manage to beat Tampa.
You can bet the Jackets, led by head coach John Tortorella, will throw everything they have at the Lightning. They sure won’t go down quietly. But how much more do they have left to throw at them?
UPDATED ODDS
According to Odds Shark, here are the updated odds for today’s game.
- CBJ: +155
- TBL: -175
- Over/under: 5 goals
At +500, the Lightning have the third-best odds of winning the Stanley Cup and the best chances in the Eastern Conference. On the other end of the spectrum, the Blue Jackets have the third-worst odds at +10000.
STARTING GOALTENDERS
The Blue Jackets haven’t confirmed anything yet, but I’d be surprised if they don’t stick with Korpisalo. He had a rough game by his standards in Game 4, but he’s the reason they’re here to begin with. Columbus isn’t going down without having their best player on the ice, and that’s Korpisalo.
Meanwhile, the Lightning will likely stick with Andrei Vasilevskiy in net. He was terrific in Game 4, stealing the game for Tampa. Aside from a hiccup in Game 2, Vasilevskiy has been great this entire series.
LIVE STREAM INFORMATION
Date: Wednesday, August 18
Start Time: 12:00 p.m. EST
Venue: Scotiabank Arena
Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
TV Channel: NBCSN, SN, TVAS, SUN, FS-O
Live Stream: Fubo.tv (subscription required but you get a free trial), r/NHL Streams, NBCSN
Will Tampa complete their revenge today? Or will Columbus continue to overcome adversity? Only time will tell!