While the Tampa Bay Lightning aren’t at the top of the Eastern Conference, they are still one of the best teams in the league, and winger Nikita Kucherov deserves a lot of credit for their success.
The four-time All-Star has had an amazing start to the 2022-23 season, racking up 13 goals and 37 assists in 33 games. With an assist in Tampa Bay’s recent 4-1 win over the Montreal Canadiens, Kucherov became tied with Vincent Lecavalier for the fastest player in Lightning history to reach 50 points.
Kucherov has been heating up as 2022 nears its end. On December 19th, he was named NHL Player of the Week after recording a goal and an astounding seven assists in just three games. Also, in his last five games, he has tallied two goals and six assists.
This season Kucherov has been a supreme facilitator, and he is well on his way to another amazing season down in Florida. But the winger has already cemented his place among the legendary players in Lightning history. Kucherov is already in the top five of goals, assists, and points in franchise history. In his Hart Trophy-winning 2018-19 season, he recorded the most points by a Tampa Bay player in a season.
The scary thing for the rest of the NHL is that Kucherov still has plenty of gas left in the tank. At 29 years old, the Russian winger is far from retirement. He will be torturing the league with his skill for years to come.
