NHL's Stadium Series Smash Hit

Joseph McLaughlin
7 hours ago
4 min read

by Joseph McLaughlin

Sportz Nation - 2/3/26

Photo Credit: Nathan Ray Seebeck/Imagn Images.

The NHL's Stadium Series game on Sunday had a little bit of everything. Fancy entrances, goals, comebacks, a goalie fight, controversy, history, and the coldest day in Tampa Bay since 2018. It was thrilling from start to finish, and many fans are calling it one of the best outdoor games in NHL history.

It started when the players arrived. The hometown Tampa Bay Lightning dressed as their football counterparts, wearing the Tampa Bay Buccaneers' creamsicle throwback helmets and uniforms. Bucs quarterback Baker Mayfield led them as they entered the stadium, and the team huddled up before the game. Lightning Head Coach Jon Cooper also joined in on the fun, dressing in a white pinstripe suit with a white fedora as a nod to Tampa's Cuban heritage.

It was funny to see names like Oliver Bjorkstrand and Jake Guentzel written on the back of a Buccaneers jersey, and to see Cooper dressed like he was about to go to Ybor City's Cuban Club, but the players seemed to enjoy every second of it. I wonder, will those jerseys be sold in the pro shop? I guess we'll have to see.

Jokes aside, this was very similar to the Boston Bruins' entrance to the 2023 Winter Classic, where the team dressed up as Red Sox players before entering Fenway Park. Speaking of the Bruins, the Boston hockey team entered to support their football team, the New England Patriots, by dressing as colonial-age Patriot soldiers from the Revolutionary War. It was timely considering the Patriots play in Super Bowl LX this coming Sunday, and America will turn 250 years old this July.

Photo Credit: Dirk Shadd/Tampa Bay Times

Photo Credit: Belle Fraser via BostonBruins.com.

The entrances were not the wildest thing about this game, however. Once the game began, the Lightning took a 1-0 lead courtesy of a Brandon Hagel goal in the first 11 seconds of the game. The home crowd at Raymond James Stadium was rocking and it seemed the Bruins were in for a long night. However, the B's gained more momentum as the first period went on.

Goals from Alex Steeves, Morgan Geekie, and Victor Arvidsson gave the Bruins a 3-1 after the first period. What started off rough became a great period for Boston, who played more physically than Tampa Bay, and took control of possession.

It seemed to be more of the same narrative in the second period when Matthew Poitras scored his first goal of the season in the opening two minutes of the period. Then, a few minutes later, Geekie scored his second goal of the game to give the Bruins a comfortable 5-1 cushion. The Bruins were in the driver's seat and seemed to be on their way to an easy win, until Tampa Bay took advantage of Boston's biggest weakness: Penalties.

The Bruins entered the contest with the most penalty minutes (PIM) in the NHL and committed eight penalties for 25 minutes during the game. In the second period, Tampa Bay's Bjorkstrand, Darren Raddysh, and Nick Paul scored three consecutive power play goals, two of them with a 5-on-3 advantage. The undisciplined mistakes let the Lightning back into the game and shrunk a four-goal lead to only one entering the third period.

Before the third, however, was the goalie fight between Bruins Goaltender Jeremy Swayman and Lightning Goaltender Andre Vasilevskiy. In the second half of the second period, the Lightning had the puck in the offensive zone with Hagel crashing the net. Hagel tried to poke the puck through Swayman and into the net, resulting in the Boston netminder to push Hagel to the ice, flinging his helmet off in the process.

That's when Vasilevskiy raced towards center ice to challenge Swayman. Both goaltenders agreed and dropped their blockers, gloves, and masks. The fight then ensued, with both goalies exchanging blows before Swayman lost his balance leading to Vasilevskiy dragging him to the ground for the victory. Both benches and the crowd were spurred up by the event as it was the first ever goalie fight in an outdoor game in NHL history.

The Lightning did not only win the fight at center ice, but they went on to win the game. After closing the Bruins lead to 5-4, Nikita Kucherov scored halfway through the third to tie the game and send it into overtime. In overtime it looked like the Bruins won the game off the stick of David Pastrnak, however, a controversial handling of a Bruins slashing penalty resulted in the goal not counting, leading to a shootout between the teams. Both teams would miss until Guentzel scored the game winner to complete the largest comeback in Tampa Bay Lightning history.

For Tampa Bay, it was their greatest win all season, showcasing their talents on the power play and their resilience as a team. For the Bruins, it was a catastrophic collapse, with every positive being undone but bad penalties. For the objective hockey fan, it was a thrilling game, one that many believe was better than the Winter Classic between Florida and the New York Rangers, and will talk about for a long time.