Lightning’s Andrei Vasilevskiy gets brutally honest on another early playoff exit

Another successful regular season for the Tampa Bay Lightning, in which they came in second place in the Atlantic Division, understandably led to an appearance in the Stanley Cup Playoffs that was heavy with expectations, especially for a club with so many top-tier veteran pieces.

However, the season for the Lightning came to a close in the opening round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs for the fourth straight year, this time against the Montreal Canadiens.

The Lightning, who fell into a three-games-to-two series hole, managed to force a Game 7 thanks to a spectacular overtime shutout win in Game 6 backstopped by Andrei Vasilevskiy. Despite holding the Canadiens to only nine shots in Game 7, two pucks managed to get past Vasilevskiy in a 2-1 final that ended the Bolts’ season.

Vasilevskiy, who was named a candidate for the Vezina Trophy as the NHL’s best goaltender in 2025-26, appeared to call out his teammates during his season-ending media availability, saying that the best players need to be the best players.

“We have to man up out here,” he said, via The Hockey News’ Diandra Loux. “Our big players have to be our best players. We all have to do our jobs. I have to make saves. Defense has to block shots, kill penalties, offense.. shoot and score goals. When one part of the team does the job and the other doesn’t, that’s the end of our season.”

The Canadiens move on to play the Buffalo Sabres, while the Lightning are once again left picking up the pieces after another campaign heavy with expectation came to a far earlier-than-anticipated close.

It’ll be interesting to see what changes general manager Julien BriseBois makes as Tampa Bay tries to get back to the kind of success that saw the team advance to three consecutive Stanley Cup Finals between 2020-22.

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