Tampa Bay Lightning vs New York Islanders Prediction: Can the Islanders break their losing streak?

Prediction for the NHL Tampa Bay Lightning vs New York Islanders match, which will take place on April 1. Check the team conditions and choose several betting options.

The Lightning will almost certainly finish second or third in their division at the end of the regular season, meaning they will play Toronto in the first round of the playoffs. The end of the first championship thus becomes a formality for the team.

However, the lack of tournament goals did not prevent Tampa Bay from earning two straight wins over Carolina (4:0) and Washington (5:1) on the eve of their meeting with the Islanders. Before that, they had lost four straight to New Jersey, Boston, Ottawa, and Montreal.

Unlike the Lightning, the Islanders may not yet make the playoffs. Currently, the team is seventh in the East but only four points ahead of ninth-place Florida. Now in eighth place, Pittsburgh is only three points behind the Islanders, and taking seventh or eighth place in the conference is crucial. That would avoid facing Boston in the first round of the Stanley Cup.

Despite the tenuous position in the standings, there is little doubt that the Islanders will eventually follow through and make the playoffs. The team is having an excellent second half of the championship and, considering the stretch of the last 25 games, is behind only Boston in this stage, having lost only six times during regular time.

The first game between the teams this season was very productive and resulted in a 5:3 victory for Tampa Bay. But that was at the beginning of the championship, and now it's unlikely that that history will repeat itself. The Islanders are in excellent form, only once in the last seven games, conceded more than three pucks, and surely will be severe at the Amalie Arena. Moreover, the motivation is on the side of the Islanders, who lost their first game this season to the Lightning and are still fighting to stay in the wild-card zone, unlike Tampa Bay, who only a miracle could drop below third place in the Atlantic Division. We're betting on the Islanders here, and not a very productive matchup, given the excellent goaltenders Ilya Sorokin and Andrei Vasilevskiy.