TAMPA BAY – Our team is on a four-game road trip back east and we’re ready to get it started on Tuesday against the Lightning.

We left Arizona this morning with confidence and feeling good after beating Florida on Saturday night. That was a very big win for us but we’ve got to start stringing wins together instead of just winning one here and one there. We’re working hard but we’re still searching for that consistency we need. It’s early in the season but we can’t wait too long to find it. That’s why we’re working so hard.

This long trip is coming at a good time for us. When we go on the road it pulls our team together because everybody stays in the same hotel and goes out to dinner together, and that helps team bonding. I think we need that right now.

A reporter asked me the other day how I felt about scoring five goals in our first three games. I told him it was nice but I need to keep working hard and stay focused and not get too comfortable. Consistency is the key to my game. I had a nice start, but I need to keep it going through a long year, and I haven’t scored any goals in a while now. Hopefully I can get it going again on this trip, and hopefully me and Vermy and Doaner can really get it going as a line. We haven’t been bad this season but I think we can be better.

It was fun to get my first hat trick a few weeks ago. It’s a good feeling to score just one goal so to get three in one game was very special. It was a good experience but I really can’t afford to give it another thought because I have to keep improving. That’s what good goal scorers do. They score a hat trick and then they come back and score a goal or make plays the next game and the game after that and so on. That’s the level I want to get to. I want to be consistent, night in and night out, and it’s been four games now since our line has gotten a point. That’s too long. We want to be the best line out there.

Thanks for reading this blog and for supporting us this season.

And thanks to everyone who tossed their hat on the ice that night I got my hat trick. I still have them all in my stall and I’m planning to sign them when we get back and then give them to charity.

-- Mikkel