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Tampa Bay Lightning (46-22-7) at Detroit Red Wings (39-22-12), 2 p.m. (ET)

(SportsNetwork.com) - The Tampa Bay Lightning begin their final road trip of the regular season on Saturday afternoon as they shoot for a season series sweep of the Detroit Red Wings.

The Lightning will play their next five games on the road before ending the season at home against New Jersey and Boston. On the verge of clinching a playoff spot, Tampa Bay is second in the Atlantic Division with 99 points, nine ahead of third-place Detroit and one behind the Montreal Canadiens.

Both the Bolts and Habs have seven games left to play, with Montreal hosting the Florida Panthers on Saturday.

The Red Wings are holding on to the third automatic playoff berth to come out of the division, but now lead the Ottawa Senators and Bruins by just five points for that spot thanks to losses in six of their past eight games. Ottawa and Boston also are in action today.

Detroit doesn't figure to catch Tampa Bay in the division and instead will simply be trying to beat the Lightning for the first time in four meetings this season. The Lightning have won seven of the previous eight encounters overall and three of their last four trips to Motown.

Tampa Bay figures to start in net Ben Bishop, who is a solid 7-1-0 lifetime versus Detroit with a 1.53 goals against average and .943 save percentage in nine games (8 starts).

He'll be looking to rebound after getting pulled in the second period of Thursday's 3-2 loss to the Nashville Predators in the finale of a six-game homestand. Tampa Bay had a four-game win streak halted as Bishop allowed three goals on 11 shots.

Andrei Vasilevskiy made eight saves in relief after coming in with 13:13 left in the second period, while Vladislav Namestnikov and Brian Boyle had the goals.

"We held a 100-point team to under 20 shots, and they didn't get much the whole night," Lightning head coach Jon Cooper said.

While Cooper seemed pleased with his club's defensive effort despite the loss, Red Wings head coach Mike Babcock has watched his club allow 11 goals in back- to-back setbacks. Netminder Jimmy Howard struggled in Tuesday's 5-4 overtime loss to Arizona, then got pulled early in a 6-4 setback to the San Jose Sharks two nights later.

Howard gave up three goals on just 10 shots faced in the first period, while Petr Mrazek stopped 17-of-19 shots in relief and actually took the loss as Detroit got goals from Tomas Tatar, Tomas Jurco, Henrik Zetterberg and Stephen Weiss.

"We're giving up too many goals," Babcock said. "We scored tons of goals in the last couple games, but it's like I said, we are chasing the game."

The Red Wings will visit the New York Islanders on Sunday after wrapping a four-game stay at home today and it will be Mrazek getting the start this afternoon. He has lost both of his career starts versus the Lightning, posting a 4.24 GAA and .829 save percentage.

The Red Wings were without star forward Pavel Datsyuk (lower body) for a fifth straight game and forward Erik Cole (upper body), who left Tuesday's contest and did not practice on Friday.

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