The Tampa Bay Lightning www.hurricanesshoponline.com ,defenseman Victor Hedman, will try and hang onto first place in the Atlantic Division when they face the Montreal Canadiens at Bell Centre on Saturday.The Lightning (8-3-1) are 1-2-0 since Hedman sustained an upper body injury when he was hit by Ryan Reaves of the Vegas Golden Nights a week ago. Hedman is not expected to return until next week.In his absence, the Lightning lost to the Arizona Coyotes 7-1, defeated the New Jersey Devils 8-3 and lost to the Nashville Predators 4-1, the last two games at home.Article continues below ...Lightning defenseman Slater Koekkoek, a healthy scratch until Hedman was injured, has chipped in 15 minutes of ice time in the past three games to help the Lightning cope in Hedman’s absence. He scored the Lightning goal against the Predators.“It felt good,” Koekkoek told the Tampa Bay Times. “I have a lot of people doubting me. A lot of people who don’t matter. It felt good for the people who do believe in me. My family, and the people who do matter.”“For us as a group, we kind of had to re-group and think about what we wanted to accomplish out there,” veteran defenseman Braydon Coburn told The Times. “Heddy brings so many different things to the table. Nobody is going to replace him. For us, playing our own game and working together as good partner duos is what we tried to accomplish together. We work for each other, and I thought we did that.”The Lightning will be looking to capitalize on the chances they generate against the Canadiens. They outshot the Predators 43-24, but only managed the one goal by Koekkoek.The Canadiens (7-3-2) are in third place in the Atlantic Division and are coming off a newsworthy 6-4 home win over the Washington Capitals on Thursday.Canadiens rookie Jesperi Kotkaniemi, the No. 3 pick in last summer’s draft Custom Chicago Blackhawks Jerseys , scored the first two goals of his NHL career against the Capitals. His second goal tied the game 4-4 at 16:56 of the third period and then Canadiens forwards Max Domi and Joel Armia scored two seconds apart, an NHL record for two fastest goals by one team, to give the Canadiens the win. Armia’s goal was into an empty net.“That was pretty crazy,” Kotkaniemi told NHL.com of the reception he got from the Canadiens fans. “I’ve never heard a crowd like that before.” “For me, it was the first time I’ve heard the fans so loud,” Canadiens forward Nicolas Deslauriers told montrealcanadiens.com. “I’ve always said it’s fun to play here and that the fans are loud, but (Thursday) was something special. It gave us even more energy. That’s why we often say we have the best fans. Things can change in any game and we saw it (Thursday).At the age of 18 years, 118 days, Kotkaniemi is the second-youngest player to score for the Canadiens (Mario Tremblay was 18 years, 75 days old when he scored his first goal for Montreal on Nov. 16, 1974, against the New York Rangers).“I think he has a good attitude,” Canadiens coach Claude Julien told the team’s website regarding Kotkaniemi. “In some cases there are players that put too much pressure on themselves. It’s not the case with him. He’s a player with incredible skill and in the future will develop even more.“He already has a certain obligation that comes with playing in the NHL and that’s to show up every day. He’s doing that. All we ask of him is to do it, so he just has to keep it up.” CHICAGO — Marc-Andre Fleury’s play in net will go a long way toward determining if the Vegas Golden Knights are going to repeat last season’s success.Of course, if the Golden Knights can produce offensively at a reasonable clip www.avalancheshoponline.com , it won’t hurt.Vegas will carry a three-game winning streak into Tuesday’s road test against the Chicago Blackhawks, who have struggled to establish any sort of rhythm this year coming off their first playoff-free season in more than a decade.Article continues below ...Fleury has recorded back-to-back shutouts, an accomplishment even more impressive considering the veteran goalie did it on consecutive nights. His latest standout performance came in a 6-0 victory over the San Jose Sharks on Saturday when Vegas scored four first-period goals and then coasted behind Fleury, who made 33 saves after shutting out the Calgary Flames on Friday.“I was feeling good, composed, related,” Fleury told reporters after Saturday’s victory, according to the Las Vegas Sun. “I think we’ve been starting to play a bit (more) our style, how we can play and how we should play, and it’s been playing off greatly.”The back-to-back shutouts marked the first time in Fleury’s career he has accomplished the feat on consecutive nights and the third time he has held an opposing team without a goal in back-to-back games. William Karlsson got Vegas (12-12-1) on the board just 14 seconds into the game and the Knights used Fleury’s effort to extend their winning streak.Vegas coach Gerald Gallant said he didn’t mind playing Fleury on back-to-back nights after Fleury didn’t face much pressure on Friday against the Flames. Now, after two days off heading into Tuesday’s game at the United Center, Gallant knows Fleury will be plenty rested to face Chicago.“It makes it easy when you got a guy like Fleury,” Gallant told reporters, according to the Sun. “He had enough work against Calgary, but it wasn’t like he had 50 shots and he had to make outstanding saves back-to-back. We thought he was rested Colorado Avalanche T-Shirts Womens , he felt good, and that made the decision easy for you, especially when he had the shutout the last game.”Like Vegas, the Blackhawks are coming off back-to-back games and a victory after Chicago (9-10-5) picked up a 5-4 victory over the Florida Panthers.The victory, secured by Erik Gustafsson’s overtime goal, snapped Chicago’s eight-game road losing streak and provided the Blackhawks with their third win in their past six games.The victory also preceded the Blackhawks trading Nick Schmaltz to the Arizona Coyotes for a pair of former first-round picks in forward Dylan Strome and Brendan Perlini. Schmaltz told reporters that he was shocked by the trade despite struggling with just two goals and nine assists.General Manager Stan Bowman told reporters on Monday that he believes adding Strome and Perlini improves Chicago’s depth as the Blackhawks continue to try to adjust to the style of coach Jeremy Colliton.“We got two NHL players on our team for one,” Bowman told reporters, according to NHL.com. “You have to give to get. We’re not going to get two really good players like that by not trading away a really good one.”Bowman likes what the new additions bring to the ice.“Watching both Brendan and Dylan play, I think there are a lot of attributes to their game that are going to translate well to how we want to play,” Bowman said. “They bring some size, they’re both big guys.”