Lightning head coach Jon Cooper apologizes for comments about goalies in 'skirts'

Tampa Bay Lightning head coach Jon Cooper opened his end-of-season news conference Wednesday apologizing for making what he called an inappropriate analogy of putting skirts on goalies.

Cooper after the Game 5 loss that eliminated his team from the playoffs on Monday night vented about two questionable goaltender interference rulings that contributed to Florida's 6-1 win.

The Lightning had two goals disallowed when the NHL situation room deemed a player interfered with Sergei Bobrovsky each time.

The league's longest-tenured coach said he was sincerely sorry especially as a father of two daughters who play sports and a supporter of women's hockey.

"It's one of those minutes if you could just reach back and grab the words back, I would've," Cooper said. "Quite frankly, it was wrong and I've got to go and explain myself to my girls. ... I sincerely apologize to all I offended. It's pained me more than the actual series loss itself."

Tampa Bay has made the playoffs in 10 of his 11 seasons on the job and won the Stanley Cup back to back in 2020 and '21.

"We might has well put skirts on them then... I think we're letting the goalies off the hook."<br><br>Lightning coach Jon Cooper weighs in with his perspective on the two disallowed goals tonight and the impact those decisions had on the game. <a href="https://t.co/FD1hewDsbC">pic.twitter.com/FD1hewDsbC</a>

Steven Stamkos has spent all 16 of his NHL seasons with the Lightning and he's highly interested in continuing the relationship.

Stamkos, 34, is slated to become an unrestricted free agent on July 1. But he said he had a preliminary conversation with general manager Julien BriseBois after Tampa Bay was eliminated from the post-season Monday night.

"I had a short