Some Video Game Passing Gave The Lightning A Perfect Goal

You know how in the old NHL games, you could just lazily tap the X button and see the puck move in a flawless straight line right onto your teammate’s stick? Well, the Tampa Bay Lightning just recreated that unlikely gameplay with some tic-tac-toe passing that padded their lead against San Jose.

Aided by the Sharks unintentionally icing one skater too few at the start of the possession, Nikita Kucherov sent the puck diagonally across wide-open ice to Steven Stamkos, who immediately tapped a pass through a defender and across the net, allowing Vladislav Namestnikov to tap it in. Together, the three players formed a textbook obtuse triangle, and probably executed that play better than they even do in practice.

The Sharks are going to need to bump up that difficulty setting.