Pittsburgh at Tampa Bay

Tampa Bay begins defense of its second straight Stanley Cup title with some new faces, but most importantly, they still have Andrei Vasilevskiy in net. He went 31-10-1 with a 2.21 goals-against average last season and also dominated in the playoffs. Pittsburgh will be missing two of their star skaters in Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin. Crosby isn't expected back until next week, and Malkin is out at least until December after offseason knee surgery. Tristan Jarry is the Pittsburgh starting goalie again, and he finished 2020-21 with a 25-9-3 record and 2.75 GAA, but he struggled in the playoffs with a 2-4 record and a .888 save percentage in six games. The Lightning have won seven of the past nine meetings, and they were 21-7 at home last season. Also, Tampa Bay has won 16 of 21 versus Metropolitan Division teams. Take the Lightning.