TAMPA | In victory or in defeat, Jon Cooper is usually in high spirits when it comes to talking to the media. On Wednesday night, however, the Lightning head coach was succinct.
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Taking several detours to avoid delivering the substance of his thoughts too crudely, the trained lawyer seemed to have pulled the plug and give up on this final that his team could lose on Friday night in Colorado.
Then he ended up spilling the beans.
“This setback is going to hurt more than the others. It is difficult for me to speak. I’ll do it tomorrow (Thursday)… You’ll understand what I mean when you see the winning goal again. I am heartbroken for the players because we should still be playing this game,” he said.
By reviewing the sequence, we understood what Cooper was referring to. The Lightning head coach appears to be claiming there were six Avalanche players (plus the goaltender) on the playing surface when Nazem Kadri picked up the puck.
On the original NHL-published game sheet, the numbers of seven players appeared on the line corresponding to Kadri’s goal: those of Bowen Byram, Jack Johnson, Valeri Nichushkin, Darcy Kuemper, Josh Manson, Artturi Lehkonen and Kadri.
Obviously, another version was released later. Which is nothing to eliminate Cooper’s doubts.
Cooper may complain about the situation, but he can’t change it. Friday night, his team will face elimination.
Kuemper initiates the sequence
Moreover, even if it did not always seem easy and even if he gave a gift to Victor Hedman, Kuemper, withdrawn from the third game by his coach, responded well. He repelled 37 shots.
“We spoke yesterday (Tuesday). Jared (Bednar) wanted to make sure I would be back in goal. He wanted me to be calm and play my game. I know the guys supported me. I wanted to play at the height of what I can do. »
In addition to stopping pucks, Kuemper started the winning streak.
“We’ve been in their zone for a while. Their players looked exhausted, so I wanted to return the puck as quickly as I could. Luckily, we were able to initiate a push. Lehky (Artturi Lehkonen) handed the puck to Naz (Nazem Kadri) who made the game brilliant. »