from Dan Rosen of NHL.com,
The Tampa Bay Lightning, led by coach Jon Cooper, have the talent and core players to win the Stanley Cup in the near future, general manager Julien BriseBois said Thursday, two days after they were swept by the Columbus Blue Jackets in the Eastern Conference First Round.
Though the Lightning became the first team in NHL history to finish with the best regular-season record and get swept in the first round in a best-of-7 format, BriseBois spoke of his belief in Cooper and players like forward Nikita Kucherov, center Steven Stamkos, defenseman Victor Hedman and goalie Andrei Vasilevskiy.
"I have great faith that eventually we're going to get the job done and we're going to bring the Cup back to Tampa with this group of players, with these coaches," BriseBois said during Lightning exit interviews. "I'm not going to overreact and blow up all the good things we have here because we had a very bad four-game slump at the most inopportune time of the year.
"Now is not the time to make excuses. It's the time to show some humility. It's the time for us to lick our wounds, roll up our sleeves, get to work and focus on doing what we need to do so next year we're more successful."
from Jonathan Bombulie of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review,
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