The Games.org

Goaltenders

30 Marc Denis L
40 Johan Holmqvist L

Defensemen

3 Doug Janik L
7 Luke Richardson L
21 Cory Sarich R
22 Dan Boyle R
44 Nolan Pratt L
54 Paul Ranger L
71 Filip Kuba L




Forwards

4 Vincent Lecavalier - A C L
9 Eric Perrin C/w L
15 Nikita Alexeev LW L
17 Ruslan Fedotenko LW L
18 Rob DiMaio (IR) RW R
19 Brad Richards - A C L
20 Vaclav Prospal RW L
24 Andreas Karlsson C L
26 Martin St. Louis RW L
27 Tim Taylor - C C L
29 Dmitry Afanasenkov RW R
34 Ryan Craig C L
49 Blair Jones C R
74 Nick Tarnasky C L

The Tampa Bay Lightning is a professional ice hockey team based in Tampa, Florida. They play in the National Hockey League (NHL).

Entering the 2002-03 season, the Lightning's largely young roster was thought to be a few years away from contention. However, the team arrived considerably earlier than expected. Led by the goaltending of Nikolai Khabibulin and the scoring efforts of Lecavalier, Martin St. Louis, Ruslan Fedotenko, Vaclav Prospal, Fredrik Modin and Brad Richards, and with a new captain, Dave Andreychuk, the Lightning battled the Washington Capitals for first place in the Southeast Division throughout the season. They finished with 93 points, breaking the 90-point barrier for the first time in team history only two years after losing 50 games for the fourth year in a row. They won the Southeast by just one point over the Capitals. That one point made a big difference in their first round matchup with Washington.


The Tampa Bay Lightning defeated the Jarome Iginla-led Calgary Flames 4 games to 3 to win their first Stanley Cup on June 7, 2004. Ruslan Fedotenko was the Game 7 hero this time; he scored two goals in that contest. Brad Richards, who had 26 points, won the Conn Smythe Trophy; in all 31 contests in which he had scored a goal since the opening of the season, the Lightning did not lose a single game. Tortorella won the Jack Adams Award as coach of the year. Only three years after losing 50 games, the Lightning became the southernmost team ever to win the Stanley Cup. Martin St. Louis led the team and the NHL with 94 points (and his 38 goals were second-most after the 41 of tied trio Iginla, Rick Nash and Ilya Kovalchuk), and won the Hart Trophy as the league's most valuable player. St. Louis also won the Lester B. Pearson Award for league's most outstanding player as voted by the NHL Players' Association, and tied the Vancouver Canucks' Marek Malik for the NHL Plus/Minus Award.

Having entered the NHL in 1992-93, the Lightning are the third-fastest team to have a Stanley Cup win to their credit and the second-southernmost to reach the Final after the Florida Panthers. The Lightning are second-southernmost in the league overall, also behind the Panthers.

The Lightning had to wait a year to defend their title due to the 2004-05 NHL lockout, but in 2005-06 they showed little sign of departing from the NHL's elite, although they experienced an early first-round playoff exit (losing to the Ottawa Senators 4 games to 1).