Andrei Vasilevskiy saved his best for Lightning in Game 6: ‘Best goalie in the world’

The Athletic has reside protection of Canadians vs. Lightning in the 2026 NHL Playoffs.

MONTREAL — Andrei Vasilevskiy had no clue what the message was in his dressing room earlier than extra time Friday evening.

That did not appear to concern him.

“To be honest, I didn’t really hear. I was kind of one-on-one with my thoughts,” the first star of Game 6 stated. “Same as the crowd here. I don’t hear anything. Same as in the locker room. I don’t listen to anything.”

Which made the media members chuckle.

“No, seriously, too much is going on in my head to listen,” Vasilevskiy stated.

Hey, no matter works.

No. 88 was all-world Friday evening to offer his Tampa Bay Lightning an opportunity to reside one other day and pressure Game 7, his 30-save shutout simply sufficient to outduel an equally spectacular Jakub Dobeš in a 1-0 win.

“Best goalie in the world for a reason,” Lightning star Jake Guentzel stated. “He gives us a chance every night. Some of the saves he made, they were just incredible saves.”

Yes, they have been. Canadian phenom Ivan Demidov absolutely wasn’t going to sleep Friday evening. He was going to have Vasilevskiy in his nightmares, stoning him point-blank twice in Game 6.

It was an absolute gem of a efficiency from the previous Vezina Trophy and Conn Smythe Trophy winner.

“That’s just one (less) thing off your mind, you don’t have to worry about that big guy back there,” Lightning winger Brandon Hagel stated. “Because you know he’s going to be kicking ’em for you and he’s going to give you everything he possibly has. You can just go out there and play your game and worry about yourself because you know he’s going to make that save… He did that all night for us.”

Just do not name it a redemption effort.

I requested Vasilevskiy postgame if it felt good to have that type of bounce-back efficiency after what occurred in Game 5.

“What happened in Game 5?” Vasilevskiy calmly directed again.

To which I recommended he might need needed again the game-winner from Alexandre Texier.

“I mean, it was a good shot,” he stated, shrugging.

We’ll conform to disagree on that one, however there’s zero disagreement on what occurred on Friday evening. Tampa’s star goalie is the No. 1 purpose there is a Game 7 Sunday evening in Tampa.

Set in the backdrop of an electrical ambiance at the Bell Centre, with angst-filled followers oohing and aahing as every Montreal scoring likelihood bought swatted away, Vasilevskiy had zero margin for error. He needed to be excellent or the season was over.

“I’m trying to be locked in every game,” Vasilevskiy stated. “Tonight was obviously very important. Yeah, if there would have been a mistake, it would have been really costly.”

The elephant in the room the previous few playoff years for Tampa is that Vasilevskiy struggled in playoff losses to the Florida Panthers. That’s simply the actuality of the numbers.

So when he gave up that tender aim to Texier in Game 5, it made you marvel. But it did not make the head coach marvel. Not for one second.

“The bigger the stakes, the more intense the game, he seems to rise to the occasion,” Jon Cooper stated. “This will be looked at as a goaltender battle because it was a 1-0 game in overtime. But it’s the saves you make and the timing of the saves. You take a penalty in overtime. On (Lane) Hutson, that’s a big-time save. We kill it off and score a minute later. But that’s the timing of it. That’s the rising to the occasion that we’ve seen him do time and time again.”

Behind the scenes, Vasilevskiy is understood to have fairly the character; he is a fairly humorous man. This juxtaposes his unimaginable preparation when he is all enterprise.

“The Big Cat jokes around at times,” stated Game 6 extra time scorer Gage Goncalves. “But it’s pretty fun being on the outside looking into that, his preparation every single day, whether it’s practice, pregame skate or going into a game… And watching him (before overtime), just taking a look over in the dressing room, you just knew in the back of your mind you didn’t have to worry about that guy. His preparation is unbelievable and that’s what makes him the best goalie in the world.”

And due to him, we have got Sunday’s drama coming to us. What an unbelievable collection it has been. Six one-goal video games, 4 extra time endings. Of course, it needed to go seven video games.

“Both teams had 106 points this season, they’re a really, really good hockey team over there; we’re a really, really good hockey team here,” Hagel stated. “I don’t think we expected anything else than what’s going on here. They have incredible players, everything. They’ve got everything over there, and we think we’ve got everything over here. The series is going like we expected it to. It’s going to be come down to one game. And I’m excited.”

For Tampa Bay, it’s a likelihood to justify why so many individuals thought the Lightning have been going deep this 12 months. And erase the narrative that is forming that they are first-round fodder after three consecutive years being knocked out early.

There’s nonetheless a lot to be decided on Sunday between these two eventualities.

Which is why, whereas Friday evening was an unimaginable recreation and a season-saving win, the postgame message in the dressing room was additionally considered one of a veteran group.

“That was the big thing in the locker room after we won. Sure, guys were pumped. But we haven’t won anything yet,” Cooper stated. “All we did was win a game to send us back to Tampa. And keep our season alive. You don’t want to rain on the parade because, what a win by the guys. But we haven’t accomplished anything yet.”