The Lightning lost 4-3 Wednesday night in its second preseason game in as many nights against the St. Louis Blues, this time in front of a crowd of 11,688 at Amway Arena in Orlando, a city that hasn't hosted a Lightning exhibition game since 1996.
The Blues got on the board first at 15:22 in the first period, when Nikita Nikitin scored a power play goal that deflected off of Blair Jones. Although the Lightning didn't lead at any point in the game, they did tie the game up three times, with goals from Marc-Andre Bergeron, Cory Conacher and Eric Brewer all on the man-advantage.
The first tying goal came at 15:30 in the second period, when Bruno Gervais set up Marc-Andre Bergeron for a one-timer that came from the top of the right circle. Conacher made it a 2-2 score at 8:13 into the third period, on a net crashing power play goal that was set up by Brett Connolly.
The Blues responded quickly though, with a goal from Chris Stewart less than two minutes later at 10:03 of the third period. Stewart had a goal and two assists in the game. Eric Brewer, Lightning defensemen and former Blues captain, scored on a wrist shot with only 4:49 left in regulation, but later lost hold of a bouncing puck near the Lightning net, causing St. Louis's Adam Cracknell to score an unassisted goal with 2:20 remaining in the game, capping off St. Louis's second win against the Lightning in two nights.
NOTES: Lightning goaltender, Dwayne Roloson, played in the first thirty minutes of the game, allowing one goal on nine shots.Jaroslav Janus faced twelve shots, allowing three. Lightning defensemen, Mattias Ohlund had 17 minutes of penalty time, including a five-minute major and game misconduct, all in the first period for his elbowing incident on Blues winger Ryan Reaves. Cory Conacher had some playing time on a line alongside Martin St. Louis and Steven Stamkos, a reward from Lightning coach Guy Boucher, for playing well in training camp thus far. The six-foot-seven Blues goaltender, Ben Bishop, played the entire game for St. Louis.