Tampa Bay finished with an NHL-high 1,207 penalty minutes this season, which was 229 more than the next-highest team — and twice as much as the Presidents' Trophy-winning Colorado Avalanche. So far, they have continued that style in the first round of the playoffs.
If you can't beat them, then join them. Or, at the very least, steal their shtick.
That appears to be the game plan of the Tampa Bay Lightning, who after getting their teeth kicked in by the Florida Panthers in last year's playoffs have taken a page out of the two-time defending champs' bloodied notebook and become the bad boys of the NHL this season.
As Lightning coach Jon Cooper said following a 3-2 overtime win against the Montreal Canadiens in Game 2, "Somebody's got to be the villain."
With 41 combined penalty minutes in two games, that "somebody" is clearly the Lightning. And the guy leading the charge is Brandon Hagel, who in addition to combining for three goals and one assist, also has a fight and nine penalty minutes — as well as a couple of WWE-inspired taunts.
It was Hagel who instigated a line brawl near the end of the first period in Game 2, when he put Montreal's Josh Anderson in a headlock and wrestled him to the ice. And it was Hagel who then suckered Juraj Slafkovsky into dropping his gloves, before dropping the 6-foot-3 and 225-pound left winger with a right hook.
Afterward, the much-smaller Hagel made a mocking reference to the size disparity between the two players, which got some laughs out of the sold-out Tampa Bay crowd, as well as his coach.
"We're in a fun series right now," Cooper said in a post-game news conference on Tuesday. "Two games have gone to overtime. You can tell it's a couple of teams that care. I think this one's far from over."
In other words, don't expect things to simmer down for Game 3. If anything, the Lightning have figured out what works and are more likely going to double down with the extra-curricular activity.
After all, it's what has got them to this point.
While Tampa Bay was able to win back-to-back Stanley Cups in 2020 and 2021 by relying on its speed and skill to intimidate the opposition, the Lightning have evolved their game over the years as their roster has gotten older and a bit slower.
Two years ago, Tampa Bay ranked 16th in the league with 666 penalty minutes. This year, the Lightning nearly doubled that total and finished with an NHL-high 1,207 PIMs — 229 more than the next-highest team and twice as much as the Presidents' Trophy-winning Colorado Avalanche.
For Tampa Bay, there's clearly a blueprint that their following.
Last year, Florida won the Cup after first racking up an NHL-leading 843 penalty minutes in the regular season and then a playoff-leading 374 PIMs in 23 games. In 2023-24, the Panthers finished second in the league with 1,106 PIMs and then led the playoffs with 281 PIMs in 24 games. In 2022-23, Florida lost in the final while putting up 379 PIMs in 21 games.
Notice a pattern? The Lightning, who re-acquired the pesky Corey Perry at the deadline, sure did.
After Anderson knocked Tampa Bay's Charle-Edouard D'Astous out of Game 1 with a nasty hit, Cooper inserted Scott Sabourin, who had 89 penalty minutes in 26 games this season, into the lineup for Game 2. The result was a battle where there were a combined 77 hits and 23 players from both teams spent time in the penalty box.
And though Sabourin ended up taking what could have been a costly interference penalty when he hit Anderson from behind in the final minutes of the third period, Cooper was happy with the style his team is playing.
"We're OK with it," Cooper told reporters. "The guys play hard. They're a determined group. And when there are obstacles in the way, they'll try and get through it any way possible. And if it's fighting their way through it, that's what happens. But it's served us well. It's got us in a playoff spot."
Trying to bully your opponent can, of course, come with its challenges.
"It's not the ideal recipe," Cooper said, "but it's one less penalty than we took the night before. So if we can keep doing that, by the time we get to Game 6 we should be OK."
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