The Tampa Bay Lightning have announced a rescheduled date for their postponed home opener against the Carolina Hurricanes on Oct. 12. It will be played on Tuesday, Jan. 7 at 7 p.m.
The game was postponed due to Hurricane Milton.
Along with the regular-season home opener, the preseason game against the Nashville Predators on Oct. 7 was canceled. Coincidentally, it had already been postponed from Sept. 27 due to Hurricane Helene that hit Florida a couple of weeks earlier.
The game’s postponement was announced on Oct. 10, the day after Milton made landfall on the Gulf Coast of Florida. It was the most intense hurricane the Tampa Bay area has experienced in over a century.
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The Lightning and their staff left early for their season opener against the Hurricanes on Oct. 11 — the first part of a home-and-home to start the season — in order to get out of the way of the storm.
Through 16 games, the Lightning sit in third place in the Atlantic Division with a 9-6-1 record and 19 points. Meanwhile, the Hurricanes sit at the top of the Metropolitan Division with a 13-4-0 record with 26 points.
In the season opener between the two teams, the Lightning won 4-1.
With the change to the schedule, the Lightning now have a two-game homestand in the early days of the new year. Originally, they were going to have a single home game against the Boston Bruins sandwiched between two three-game road trips.
