November 2, 2026
November 2, 2026
Tampa Bay Lightning 2025-26 Season: Trophies, Then Heartbreak
Few teams have collected the league’s biggest regular-season awards and still walked away empty. The Lightning’s 2025-26 season did exactly that. Tampa Bay won 50 games, rode a Hart Trophy campaign from Nikita Kucherov, and leaned on a Vezina-winning Andrei Vasilevskiy. Then a seven-game war with Montreal ended it all in the first round.
General manager Julien BriseBois did not tear anything down after a third straight first-round exit. He chose continuity instead. Yanni Gourde signed a six-year extension in June, and Pontus Holmberg arrived as a depth forward on July 1. Jakob Pelletier joined a day later. Prospect Isaac Howard was dealt to Edmonton for center Sam O’Reilly.
The coaching staff took a hit. Assistant Jeff Blashill left to become head coach in Chicago, and Mathieu Darche departed to run the New York Islanders. Dan Hinote filled the bench vacancy. The message was clear. Jon Cooper’s core of Kucherov, Vasilevskiy, Brayden Point, Brandon Hagel, and Jake Guentzel would get another shot to prove it still had a Cup run left.
The opening weeks raised real doubts. Tampa Bay dropped its first two games, the first 0-2-0 start of the Cooper era. October closed at a middling 5-4-2. One night in that month still glowed. On October 25 against Anaheim, Kucherov reached 1,000 career points and captain Victor Hedman hit 800.
November flipped the story. The Lightning ripped off an 11-3-0 month and climbed back into the Atlantic race. Darren Raddysh began to emerge as a scoring threat from the blue line. The defense corps was battered by injuries all year, and Raddysh seized the minutes that opened up. On December 31, Cooper coached his 1,000th NHL game.
January turned a good team into a dangerous one. Tampa Bay went 11-1-1 in the month, and its point streak reached 13 games with a 4-1 win over Dallas on January 18. Cooper picked up his 600th win along the way. Vasilevskiy notched his 350th the next night.
Then came the night Tampa will tell stories about for decades. On February 1, a crowd of 64,617 packed Raymond James Stadium for the Stadium Series against Boston. Hagel scored 11 seconds in, tying the franchise mark for the fastest goal. The Bruins answered with a barrage and built a 5-1 lead. The building fell quiet. Tampa Bay clawed back with three power-play goals, and Kucherov tied it in the third. Guentzel buried the only goal of the shootout. The 6-5 Stadium Series comeback became the signature win of the Lightning’s 2025-26 season.
Kucherov played like a man with something to prove at 32. He scored 44 goals, matching his career high, and added 86 assists for 130 points in 76 games. His plus-43 led the team. He tied a franchise record with nine straight multipoint games. On April 6, he scored his 400th career goal.
Connor McDavid edged him for the Art Ross. The voters still sided with Kucherov, who won the Hart Trophy by 10 votes over McDavid. It was his second MVP award, and it confirmed that his fourth straight 100-point season was no fluke.
Vasilevskiy returned to his best form. He went 39-15-4 in 58 appearances with a 2.31 goals-against average and a .912 save percentage. He reached 20 wins for a 10th straight season. The workload and consistency earned him his second Vezina Trophy, presented in June.
Tampa Bay finished third in the league in goals against per game. Its penalty kill ranked third as well. That structure gave Vasilevskiy a foundation, and he made the most of it.
Raddysh delivered the breakout of the year. He piled up a career-best 70 points and set the franchise record for goals by a defenseman. His first career hat trick came on January 3 in a 7-3 rout of San Jose.
Guentzel set career highs with 50 assists and 88 points, and he scored his 300th career goal on March 24. Anthony Cirelli posted a plus-38 and led the team in faceoff wins. J.J. Moser finished plus-41. Those numbers explain why Tampa Bay ranked fourth in scoring and won 24 games after trailing.
The final weeks tested the roster’s depth. BriseBois brought back a familiar face on March 6, acquiring Corey Perry from Los Angeles. Defenseman Ian Mitchell arrived from Detroit six days later. On March 25, Hedman took a leave of absence for personal reasons, and the team closed ranks around its captain.
Tampa Bay held steady through the uncertainty. The Lightning clinched a playoff spot on April 4, extending their postseason streak to nine straight years. They finished 50-26-6 with 106 points, second in the Atlantic behind Buffalo and third in the East. A plus-59 goal differential reflected a complete team. The full numbers are on Wikipedia’s season page.
A first-round date with the Canadiens looked manageable on paper. It turned into the tightest series of the spring. Game 1 at Amalie Arena went to overtime, and Juraj Slafkovsky completed a hat trick to steal a 4-3 win.
Game 2 carried the weight of a must-win. Hagel answered with a Gordie Howe hat trick, the first in Lightning playoff history. The score sat tied 2-2 after regulation. Then Moser stepped up and scored in overtime for a 3-2 win. Hagel scored in each of the first four games, tying a franchise record.
The series moved north and stayed razor thin. Montreal took Game 3 in overtime, 3-2. Tampa Bay answered with a 3-2 win in Game 4. Back home for Game 5, the Lightning fell 3-2 again and faced elimination.
Game 6 was the night the season hung by a thread. Neither team scored through 60 minutes at the Bell Centre. Kucherov went to the box for tripping in overtime, and the Lightning killed it. Moments later, Gage Goncalves pounced on his own rebound at 9:03. Vasilevskiy stopped all 30 shots for a 1-0 win and his eighth career playoff shutout.
Game 7 on May 3 belonged to the finest of margins. Montreal scored first on a puck that deflected off Moser. Rookie Dominic James answered on the power play, becoming the first rookie in franchise history to score in a Game 7. Then Alex Newhook banked a loose puck in off Vasilevskiy in the third period. A final power play with seconds left produced nothing. As theScore reported, the 2-1 loss ended the series.
Hagel led the club with six goals and eight points in the series. Guentzel matched him with eight points. Kucherov managed one goal, and Montreal’s Jakub Dobes outdueled Vasilevskiy when it mattered most.
The Lightning’s 2025-26 season produced one of the great individual award hauls in league history. Cooper won the Jack Adams Award on June 3. Vasilevskiy collected the Vezina three days later. Kucherov claimed the Hart on June 11. Three major trophies landed in one franchise in one spring.
None of them erased the sting. The Game 7 loss marked a fourth consecutive first-round exit, and BriseBois admitted the early ending would overshadow everything else. That was the cruel truth of this team. Tampa Bay played as well as anyone for six months and lost a series decided by single goals.
The core still owns two Stanley Cups and the hardware to prove it remains elite. What it lacked was one more bounce in one more game. For a fanbase that measures seasons by June, the 2025-26 campaign will be remembered as brilliant, decorated, and unfinished.
7th February, 2017
17th June, 2026
5th March, 2016
29th March, 2016
17th April, 2016
November 1st, 2026 2
November 1st, 2026 2
November 1st, 2026 2
