Tampa Bay Lightning vs. Colorado Avalanche Best Bet: Should We Expect Goals?

Tampa Bay Lightning vs. Colorado Avalanche Best Bet: Should We Expect Goals?

We made it. While the NBA Finals are ending the Stanley Cup final is starting tonight on ABC. You have the Tampa Bay Lightning looking for three straight titles and a dynasty and they put the nasty in that word as they have played some tremendous defense in their last series with the Rangers and the Panthers before that.

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Tampa Bay Lightning vs. Colorado Avalanche Line Movement

Tampa Bay Lightning vs. Colorado Avalanche Prediction

They had a long layoff and came out rusty and gave up six goals in the first game against New York and then held them to five goals in the last four games as their all world goalie played just like that.

But, Colorado is not the New York Rangers, this team is on a five game winning streak and swept Nashville and the Oilers and their high flying Batman and Robin act. The question  tonight is will the nine-day layoff affect Colorado like it did Tampa against the Rangers in the last series. 

It's been almost 40 years since a team won three in a row when the Islanders did it and Tampa is just four wins away from doing that. The Lightning have one thing going for them that is a huge advantage and that is experience because this team has played more playoff games than anyone and they have been down in two of the three playoff series a complete contrast to Colorado this year.

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This team has had to face a lot and they have delivered every time beating the best the East has to offer.  They played each other two times this season with Colorado winning both games by a goal so we know this series will not have blowouts and the Lightning might finally get back Brayden Point, who will be a huge addition to this offense. The last series is nothing like what we will see in the Finals as we expect Colorado to do what Florida and New York didn't and that's to put up some goals and the Lightning know you can't contain this team so they will have to play a more offensive series. 

Ray Bourque that's the name in Colorado because that's the last time the Avalanche won the Stanley Cup and it's been a long road (over twenty years) to get back here and no one wants to be this close and not finish it.

The Avalanche have two players with titles almost as many as they have in the front office with Joe Sakic, so this team lacks in experience but they don't lack on offense as the first game against the Predators had nine goals and 14 against Edmonton. The Avalanche haven't played a game in nine days just like the Lightning didn't and got mauled by the Rangers in game one of the finals.

We feel that the delay will affect them and even though goalie Darcy Kuemper is back and at full strength, he wasn't stopping that many pucks before he got hurt in the Oilers series. The Lightning get one of their stars back, the Avalanche are still without Nazem Kadri who  is a big loss and we don't know if and when he will be back from the thumb surgery.

The Avalanche were a machine at home and if they want to win this cup they have to show the world and the Lightning early that they can get to Vasilevsky and score more than one or two goals like he has been giving up in the playoffs. In the last 11 games, Vasilevskiy has given up two or less in every game except the six in the layoff game (one versus New York). If he does that tonight it will set a tone and Colorado doesn't want that tone set, especially with home ice. 

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Six goals is not easy, especially when you are facing a goalie who is 46-19 record with a 1.99 GAA and .931 SV% in the playoffs during this Cup run. But, the Avalanche are the number one scoring playoff team this year at 4.64 a game even though the goalies haven't been close to what they are about to face in this series.

The key tonight will be when both teams are on power plays they need to score and with so much firepower out there and the layoff we feel Tampa has a good shot of getting to them early and making Colorado play catch up. We don't expect the eight or nine or even fourteen goals like we had in the Game 1's these teams have had recently but we will take the over six goals and hope we have a tie going into overtime or an empty netter late to win it. Let's enjoy the Cup because these are the two best teams and hitting over six or getting a live number at 5.5 will be nice as well. Every book currently has six so that's what everyone should get tonight. GL

Tampa Bay Lightning vs. Colorado Avalanche Pick

• OVER 6 -110 (Bet $110 to win $100)