Bishop Stones Carolina - Again: Lightning 3, Hurricanes 0

For the second time in two seasons the Carolina Hurricanes were shut out by Ben Bishop and the Tampa Bay Lightning, this time by a score of 3-0 on Friday night in front of 14,828 at the PNC Arena.

Bishop pushed his record to 8-2-0 and earned his first shutout of the season.  The Canes were unable to put much pressure on the goalie until late in the game and have now lost four games in a row while compiling a very disappointing one win in seven attempts, so far this season on home ice.

Both teams got off to a very slow start in this one as they managed just a total of eight shots, (Canes 5, Bolts 3), in a scoreless first period.

The Lightning were able to light the lamp for the first time midway through the second period when Victor Hedman banked a shot off the endboards which took a perfect bounce toward the net.  Justin Peters did not see the puck until it was too late and it bounced in the net off of the back of his pads, to make it 1-0.

The game remained a 1-0 contest until 11:38 was gone in the third.  The Lightning were putting on intense pressure and Peters was making save after save until Steven Stamkos finally ripped one past him to make it, 2-0.  Stamkos had a total of nine shots on goal for the game and would not be denied.

At this point Carolina had only mustered two shots on goal for the period and they were having trouble mounting any consistent pressure.  They finally started to crash the net and make Bishop work a bit, but they were still unable to get anything past the 6'7 inch goalie.

With just 2:46 left, Alex Killorn was able to beat Peters on an odd man rush to make it 3-0 and salt the game away.

One bright spot in the game for the home team was that newcomer Manny Malhotra came as advertised and won 15 of 20 faceoffs for a team high 75%.

The Canes will travel right after this game to New York to take on the Rangers on Saturday night.

Game Notes:

• Alexander Semin and Eric Staal each had a team high five shots on goal.  As mentioned earlier, Stamkos had a game high nine while Martin St. Louis had seven.
• Peters made several fine saves but admitted that he needed to be better on the one that got past him from the end boards.  Still, his team gave him zero goal support in this one.
• The Carolina powerplay had more bad moments than good and failed to click.  The penalty kill did keep the Lightning off the board as all goals were even strength. 
  
• Tim Gleason and Tuomo Ruutu were credited with five hits each. 
  
• Andrej Sekera played a team high 24:55 and also had a team high three blocked shots.