Fare thee well, Tampa Bay Lightning and Pittsburgh Penguins. We hardly knew ye.

Here's what happened in the NHL Tuesday night (check out replays of every playoff game on ESPN+), and what to watch for Wednesday night, in today's edition of ESPN Stanley Cup Playoffs Daily:

Jump ahead: Last night's games | Three Stars
Play of the night | Today's games | Social post of the day

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About last night ...

Game 4: Columbus Blue Jackets 7, Tampa Bay Lightning 3. (Blue Jackets win series 4-0.) If you go by Vegas odds, the Washington Capitals' loss to No. 8 seed Montreal in 2010 was technically the bigger upset, but it's the manner in which the Blue Jackets dispatched the Lightning that makes this one of the most shocking series results in Stanley Cup playoff history: a four-game sweep. The final score was inflated by a few empty-netters, because this was a one-goal game for most of the third period.

To the Lightning's credit, their stars finally showed up. But that was after Columbus built a 2-0 lead just 3:48 into the game. The soul-crushing moment of Game 4: Oliver Bjorkstrand's goal on a delayed penalty with 1:14 left in the second period, coming 54 seconds after Brayden Point tied the game. The team that tied the NHL record for most wins in a season, eliminated in four straight games. "If you don't accomplish the goal of winning it all, it's a failure. We don't care about what happened in the regular season," Steven Stamkos said.

Game 4: New York Islanders 3, Pittsburgh Penguins 1. (Islanders win series 4-0.) It took four games, but Sidney Crosby finally earned a point in this series, assisting on Jake Guentzel's goal just 35 seconds into a do-or-die Game 4.

That would be the only goal the Penguins would score, as once again the Islanders' combination of stingy team defense, solid goaltending from Robin Lehner (32 saves) and timely scoring never gave the Penguins even a hint of momentum during the game -- like when Jordan Eberle answered the Pittsburgh goal just 1:34 later, his fourth goal of the series. The Islanders are in the second round of the playoffs for just the second time in 26 years. And they didn't need John Tavares to do it.

Game 4: Winnipeg Jets 2, St. Louis Blues 1 (OT). (Series tied 2-2.) If the question was whether Blues rookie goalie Jordan Binnington could bounce back from a subpar effort in Game 3, the answer is yes: He stopped 37 shots and was solid. If the question was whether Winnipeg could do what the Blues did to them and take two games on the road, the answer is also yes: Thanks to 31 saves from Connor Hellebuyck and clutch goals from Mark Scheifele and Kyle Connor, who had the overtime winner, this series is now deadlocked.

Game 4: Vegas Golden Knights 5, San Jose Sharks 0. (Knights lead series 3-1.) The Sharks are in deep trouble, as the Knights have a chance to knock them out of the playoffs for the second straight season. Marc-Andre Fleury made 28 saves, Max Pacioretty had two goals and two assists, and the Knights once again jumped on the Sharks early and didn't look back. Martin Jones was pulled again after allowing two goals on seven shots in the first period. "He's gotta be better. Both the goalies gotta be better," said coach Peter DeBoer. "You can't put this all on the goalies, you have to score, too." The Sharks, who were missing center Joe Thornton due to suspension, have now been outscored 16-6 in their three straight losses to Vegas.

Three Stars

1. Mark Scheifele, Winnipeg Jets. His crease-crashing goal tied the game at 7:33 of the third period, and his shot-rebound-pass sequence in overtime resulted in a layup goal for Connor. That was all the offense the Jets needed to beat Jordan Binnington and the Blues.

2. Max Pacioretty, Vegas Golden Knights. His four-point game (two goals, two assists) set a career playoff high for the winger. Pacioretty's goal at 1:11 of the first period was also the 10th time in 18 games that the Golden Knights scored in the first five minutes against the Sharks.

3. Robin Lehner, New York Islanders and Sergei Bobrovsky, Columbus Blue Jackets (tie). We don't usually do ties here, but we'll make an exception for the backbones of their teams' respective first-round sweeps. Bobrovsky gets some extra credit for shattering the narrative that he's a leaky playoff goalie, posting a .932 save percentage for the series. Meanwhile, Lehner's rocking a .956.

Play of the night

A wild Steven Stamkos appears! pic.twitter.com/XDV71D2apQ - Pete Blackburn (@PeteBlackburn) April 16, 2019

It took four games -- well, six if you track it back to last postseason -- but Steven Stamkos didn't leave the postseason without a little goal-scoring wizardry, dekeing through the Columbus defense.

Dud of the night

Martin Jones. The biggest vulnerability for the Sharks entering this series was goaltending, and it remains that way after four games. He's rocking a playoffs-worst .838 save percentage, having been pulled twice in the series.

On the schedule

Boston Bruins at Toronto Maple Leafs, Game 4, 7 p.m. ET (Leafs lead series 2-1)

Toronto tries to build on its impressive Game 3 win -- again without Nazem Kadri -- while the Bruins seek to do what they did in Game 2 to beguile them.

Nashville Predators at Dallas Stars, Game 4, 8 p.m. ET (Predators lead 2-1)

In this goalie duel, Pekka Rinne (.936) has been slightly better than Ben Bishop (.931), while the Predators' offense (2.33 goals per game) has been slightly better than that of the Stars (2.00).

Calgary Flames at Colorado Avalanche, Game 4, 10 p.m. ET (Avalanche lead 2-1)

Hey, the lowest-seeded wild card in the Eastern Conference just took out the top seed, so anything can happen. Especially when the Avs have been rolling in the past two games, as Nathan MacKinnon has three goals in three games.

Social post of the day

#NewProfilePic>pic.twitter.com/jeapifK8u2 - Matt Hendricks (@MattHendy26) April 17, 2019

A tribute to teammate Kyle Connor from amateur Photoshop artist Matt Hendricks. We'll let you suss out the acronym.

Quotable

"I had beers poured on me!" -- John Tortorella, on the Blue Jackets' bench celebration when they scored their (first) empty-netter.

Paris Saint-Germain missed another opportunity to seal their eighth Ligue 1 title when their much-changed side were beaten 3-2 at strugglers Nantes on Wednesday.

Victory would have put PSG out of reach at the top of the standings with six games left, but Dani Alves's opener was cancelled out by Diego Carlos before Majeed Waris and an own goal by Alves gave the Canaries all three points at La Beaujoire.

PSG's Metehan Guclu reduced the arrears a minute from fulltime in his maiden Ligue 1 appearance.

It was an embarrassing performance from runaway leaders PSG, who have 81 points from 32 games and lead second-placed Lille by 17 points.

Thomas Tuchel's side, who have now picked up only one point from their last three Ligue 1 outings, will be crowned champions on Sunday if they beat Monaco at home.

PSG were without the injured Neymar, Edinson Cavani, Thiago Silva, Marquinhos and Thomas Meunier, a situation that led the German coach to complain about the lack of depth of his squad last weekend.

Marco Verratti and Juan BernatJuan were suspended while Kylian Mbappe and Angel Di Maria were rested ahead of Sunday's league game against Monaco and the April 27 French Cup final against Stade Rennes.

Their firepower was sorely missed as Eric Choupo-Moting barely threatened throughout, apart from when he hit the post in the second half.

Alves, however, opened the scoring after 19 minutes with a splendid long-range lob after collecting a cross from Leandro Paredes.

Yet Carlos headed home the equaliser four minutes later as PSG, who suffered a 5-1 humiliation at Lille last Sunday, looked shaky.

Waris put the hosts ahead a minute before the interval when he deflected a team mate's shot past Gianluigi Buffon.

Nantes doubled their advantage six minutes into the second half as Carlos's attempt form a corner deflected in off Alves.

Guclu, 20, celebrated his first top flight appearance by finding the net with a fine low shot from inside the box.

The result lifted Nantes up to 14th on 37 points, 12 above the relegation zone.

A Florida judge issued a temporary protective order Wednesday stopping the release of video evidence of sexual services Robert Kraft allegedly received from a massage parlor.

Kraft's legal team had been scrambling to stop the release after the Palm Beach County State Attorney's office surprised the New England Patriots and other defendants Wednesday morning by announcing they would release the video as soon as possible, saying Florida's broad open records laws gave them no other option.

Judge Joseph Marx has scheduled a hearing for April 29 to rule on the video evidence.

Kraft and 24 other men were charged with misdemeanor solicitation of prostitution in February after police identified them as having received services at the Orchids of Asia Day Spa in Jupiter, Florida. Part of the evidence collected against the men, as well as two women who ran the spa, was video surveillance installed by police.

Kraft and other defendants filed motions to have the video evidence sealed and suppressed last month, and a hearing was scheduled on the matter for April 26. But State Attorney Dave Aronberg filed an intent to release the evidence Wednesday morning as part of the case against the two women, Hua Zhang and Lei Wang, not in the cases against Kraft and the other men.

Kraft, who is fighting the two misdemeanor charges with a notably large legal team, responded by filing a motion to intervene in the case against Zhang and Wang. Kraft's team argues that there is no public interest served by releasing the video, and that no action should be taken before a judge has a chance to rule on their motions to seal or suppress the evidence.

Prosecutors offered him and the other defendants a diversion agreement last month that would allow them to have the cases expunged and the evidence sealed if they agreed to certain conditions, including an admission that they would have lost had the case gone to court. But Kraft has refused to concede that he committed a crime, and has, instead, mounted an expensive legal defense that has surprised both prosecutors and some members of his own inner circle.

A group of media companies, including ESPN, have intervened in the case, suing for the release of all material, including the video evidence. State prosecutors said in court documents that there is nothing about Kraft's case that allows them to withhold the evidence from the public. The material might be obscene, but that's not a reason to exempt it from release, they argued. The filing also noted that as a practice, the state pixelates or blurs sexually graphic content.

The Alliance of American Football, which suspended operations earlier this month in the midst of its first season, filed a petition for bankruptcy Wednesday in a Texas court.

Based on the filing of assets and liabilities, the league -- under the limited liability corporation Legendary Field Exhibitions LLC -- had $11,372,298.68 in assets and $48,366,188.90 in liabilities.

Those liabilities include $9,642,171 in money owed to creditors.

"We are deeply disappointed to be taking this action," the AAF said in a statement Wednesday. "The AAF was created to be a dynamic, developmental professional football league powered by an unprecedented alliance between players, fans and the game. The AAF strove to create new opportunities for talented players, coaches, executives and officials while providing an exciting experience for fans. We are proud of the fact that our teams and players delivered on that goal."

The AAF said a trustee would be put in place to resolve all matters related to assets and liabilities, "including ongoing matters related to player contracts."

The league, despite millions of dollars invested in it, has $536,160.68 in the bank and only $78,582 in licenses, franchises and royalties. The money was held in three accounts -- $500,000 in a collateral money market account, $36,116.72 in an LLC operating account and $43.96 in an account with the Birmingham Iron name on it.

Among the debt is $7 million owed to MGM Resorts International for "security interest in intellectual property."

The league and a lot of the LLCs created with it -- including AAF Players, AAF Properties and Ebersol Sports Media Group -- are filing Chapter 7 bankruptcy petitions.

"We thank our players, coaches and employees for their commitment to the game of football and to this venture," the AAF said in its statement. "Our fans believed in the AAF from the beginning, and we thank them for their support. We are hopeful that our players, coaches and others will find opportunities to pursue their football dreams in the future."

Chapter 7 bankruptcy is the most common form of bankruptcy. It means the league will gather and sell its assets to pay creditors according to the U.S. Bankruptcy Code. Property such as real estate -- although it isn't clear whether the AAF owned any -- can be exempt, but all other assets can be liquidated.

That includes equipment purchased by the league that was returned to a San Antonio warehouse earlier this month, according to a league source.

"The AAF is committed to ensuring that our bankruptcy proceeds in an efficient and orderly manner," the league said in the statement.

The AAF had financial struggles throughout its existence, eventually necessitating a pledge of $250 million in funding from Carolina Hurricanes owner Tom Dundon -- the league got much less -- before the second week of games to keep the league afloat.

Dundon decided to shutter the league two months later, on April 2, which has spurred three class-action lawsuits.

SPOKANE, Wash. -- Gonzaga forward Brandon Clarke, who led the nation in blocked shots this season, plans to skip his senior year and enter the NBA draft. Clarke is No. 12 in the ESPN rankings of top NBA prospects.

Under new NCAA rules, the junior can sign with an agent and still return to school if he chooses. Clarke has until May 29 to make a final decision.

Clarke's 117 blocks were the most in the country. He averaged 16.9 points and 8.6 rebounds per game in his first season with Gonzaga after transferring from San Jose State. Clarke also led the nation in field goal shooting percentage (68.7).

Earlier this week, Gonzaga forward Rui Hachimura also said he would skip his senior year to enter the draft.

THE VISITORS LOCKER room inside Staples Center is almost empty. An hour has passed since the Golden State Warriors defeated the Los Angeles Lakers, in the second game of the season for DeMarcus Cousins. The center, who missed nearly a year because of a ruptured left Achilles tendon, makes his way out of the shower on this January night, as Kevin Durant gets dressed at a nearby locker. Members of the Warriors' public relations staff are wrapping up while a couple of locker room attendants make their way from stall to stall, cleaning out the remnants of a joyous occasion for a group that was excited to add Cousins to an already talented lineup.

Cousins had listened as fans, both online and in person, told him he had hurt the game of basketball by signing a one-year, $5.3 million deal with the Warriors, and channeled that criticism into his work to get back on the court.

Durant and the rest of Cousins' new teammates watched as the 6-foot-11, 270-pound center grinded through a difficult rehab process. They were proud of the work and time he invested into becoming an All-Star-caliber player again.

Seven months after signing that contract, Cousins is talking about legacy and perception as he sits in that quiet Staples Center locker room. He doesn't hold back about the unlikely series of events that had to unfold to bring this group together. The big man points at Stephen Curry's empty locker stall for emphasis.

"Who the hell would have ever known he had to take a pay cut early on in his career because of his health?" Cousins tells ESPN. "Who could have ever planned that? You think they planned, 'You know what? We're going to give him a pay cut because his ankles are bad.'"

Cousins is just starting to roll. He's pointing at the empty locker stalls of Klay Thompson and Draymond Green as Durant listens intently a few feet away.

"We're going to wait for Kevin Durant to come around," Cousins continues. "Klay's going to turn into one of the greatest shooters of all time. How can you plan for that? Draymond Green was a bench player when he came into [the league]. He was barely drafted. He was barely drafted! Who the f--- knew he was going to turn into the Defensive Player of the Year?"

Cousins' voice starts to rise with a mix of excitement and frustration. He knows how special this group is. But he also understands circumstance, a fact that was never lost on him. He appeared to be on the verge of signing a max extension with the New Orleans Pelicans after last season -- and then, in an instant, that dream was over.

"Who knew I was blowing my Achilles?" Cousins says. "I never in a million years would have thought I would end up with Golden State. Never. And if you seen my past and the way I play, I was one of the main guys that wanted to bring their s--- down. I never in a million years thought I would be here."

But he was. And while he never expected to end up with the Warriors -- especially not this way -- he was thrilled with his teammates, his setting and his role on the court. For someone who'd never played postseason basketball, the ability to be an important part of a team favored to win a third consecutive NBA title made everything that came before it worth it.

THE WARRIORS AFFECTIONATELY called it "Boogie Season."

Starting in late November 2018 and carrying through Cousins' return in mid-January, Cousins played in several 5-on-5, full-court contact games to ease him back to action. For Cousins and the Warriors players, this was the highlight of the rehab program, designed by Warriors director of sports medicine and performance Dr. Rick Celebrini, that would allow Cousins to adapt to game-specific needs while exceeding its demands in a controlled, calculated environment. Strength, power, balance, core, agility and movement were all a focus with constant monitoring and strengthening of Cousins' tendon, soft tissue work and nutrition.

Three times, Cousins was actually forced to sit down and put pen to paper, taking hybrid variations of the "Injury-Psychological Readiness to Return to Sport Scale" aptitude tests, in which he answered six questions, providing a score between 0-to-100 on where his confidence level was regarding his surgically repaired Achilles.

While all that was happening, the brooding center played in these 5-on-5 pickup games one to three times a week, depending on when and where the Warriors could fit in these scrimmages.

Typically they came after the Warriors had a practice or shootaround. Cousins would take the floor and start running full court with a motley crew of volunteers, including assistant coaches, staff members, some of the younger Warriors prospects, video coordinators and even Thompson's older brother Mykee, who played briefly with the Cleveland Cavaliers in 2012.

It became a popular hangout for the rest of the Warriors' players. For many, this was their first glimpse of Cousins on the court.

"Them guys were playing pickup like every other day," Green says. "[I remember] watching DeMarcus go crazy on everybody, but yet out there working. It was good to watch his improvements from when he first started to obviously the end when he was ready to get back on the floor."

Cousins averaged 25.2 points, 12.9 rebounds, 5.4 assists and 1.6 blocks in his final season with the Pelicans, earning his fourth consecutive All-Star selection before he went down with the Achilles injury. However, during his 5-on-5 scrimmages, Cousins was delivered a stinging dose of reality that let him know just how far away he was from returning to that form.

In one of his first pickup games over the winter, Cousins tried his go-to move in the post: spinning right on the baseline and going up for a power dunk. It's a move he has executed hundreds of times before, but never with this result.

"Jordan Bell grabbed the ball out of midair and just, like, snatched it," Cousins recalls. "And I was like, 'This has never happened to me in my life.' I was like, 'Damn, I went up for the dunk and he just took it away from me like I wasn't s---.'"

Cousins was a 27-year-old star in his prime, recording a triple-double in the game he tore his Achilles. Suddenly he was getting stuffed at the rim by a second-round draft pick with barely a season's worth of experience. As the moments of frustration with his slow process piled up, the Warriors had to make sure Cousins remained patient. Even if that was the last thing he wanted to hear, Cousins bought in.

"This poor guy went from being an All-Star and looking at a free-agent contract of $100-plus million to all of the sudden a free agent with a torn Achilles and his options were limited," Warriors coach Steve Kerr says. "It was really sad for me to see him so frustrated, so down.

"Once he came back for the first game, he was an entirely different guy because he was playing again."

DESPITE ALL THE work Cousins put in, when "Boogie Season" ended and his NBA season began, he didn't exactly hit the ground running. Though the Warriors won the first five games he played, he averaged just 15.2 points on 49 percent shooting. Things got worse in late February and early March, when Cousins was made to be a scapegoat by fans and media after an inconsistent stretch in which he struggled to find his rhythm defensively and the Warriors lost some games they never would have lost in seasons past -- including a 33-point home defeat against the Boston Celtics.

Despite the criticism, Cousins' teammates and coaches stood by him both publicly and privately, offering words of encouragement. Kerr repeatedly called Cousins "a joy" to coach after many within the organization had reservations on how his personality would mesh within the championship group on and off the floor. But in a season meant to rebuild his image on the way back to what he hoped would eventually be a huge payday this summer, the harsh words from the outside stung Cousins, who went several weeks without speaking to the media. The key for the Warriors was that the criticism also motivated him, as he started to play some of his best basketball of the season.

From his debut on Jan. 18 to the end of February, the Warriors' starting five of Cousins, Curry, Thompson, Durant and Green had an offensive rating of 115.5 and a defensive rating of 116.5 for a net rating of -0.9 when they shared the court. Opponents shot 48 percent from the field and 40 percent from 3-point range against that group, which had been touted by outsiders as "unfair" when it was assembled last summer.

But from March 1 through the end of the regular season, those numbers changed dramatically as Cousins began to find his stride. The Warriors' starting five maintained a 115.8 offensive rating while posting a stingy 85.7 defensive rating, for a net rating of +30.2. Opponents shot 35 percent from the field and just 23 percent from 3-point range -- almost a 31-point per 100 possession improvement, entirely on defense.

After Cousins finished with 19 points and 11 rebounds in a win over Indiana on March 21, Green said opponents were getting a preview of things to come in the playoffs.

"They're starting to figure out," Green says when asked what element Cousins will add to the Warriors' championship mix.

When asked if it's not good for the rest of the NBA, Green replies, "Not at all."

That enthusiasm was dampened Monday night. The mood in the Warriors' locker room was somber, and not just because of the stunning Game 2 meltdown in which the Clippers came back from a 31-point third-quarter deficit. The loss was bad, but not as bad as the fact that both players and coaches knew Cousins was probably done for the playoffs, after suffering a torn left quad just four minutes into his second career postseason game.

Cousins' latest setback is another reminder of just how fragile the margins are in the postseason, even for the Warriors. Without Cousins, the Warriors must rely on young big man Kevon Looney and veteran Andrew Bogut, who re-signed with the team in March after playing in Australia this season. Bogut himself is familiar with the fickle nature of the postseason, having suffered a left knee injury that cost him the final two games of the 2016 NBA Finals, the only playoff series the Warriors have lost since 2015.

The Warriors remain confident they can withstand the loss of Cousins and still raise a banner when they open the Chase Center next season. But no matter what happens, Cousins won't be able to have the storybook ending on the floor that both he and the organization were hoping for when he signed.

When the series resumes Thursday night for Game 3, it will be at Staples Center, and the Warriors will be in the same locker room where Cousins so enthusiastically pointed out everything that had brought that group together. However, he won't be part of the group, at least on the court for the foreseeable future. Still, the goal remains the same as it was when Cousins laid it out in January.

"At the end of the day you can say what you want, you can hate it as much as you want," he says. "You can call us every name in the book. You can say whatever you want about them, you can call it whatever you want, but you're going to have to add champion at the end of it. And that's all that matters."

With Major League Baseball set to play another regular-season series in Monterrey, Mexico, next month, the general manager of one of the teams involved says he hopes the scheduling of games there not only becomes a permanent fixture but also includes a franchise south of the border whenever the commissioner's office authorizes expansion.

"This is very important for me," Houston Astros GM Jeff Luhnow told SportsCenter Mexico on Wednesday. "It's very exciting to be able to go to Mexico as the general manager of a major league team, and hopefully in the future we will have a team in the league, either in Monterrey, in Mexico City or in Guadalajara."

"That's the idea of Major League Baseball and for us is to have this on a regular basis... until one day we have a team in Mexico," he said.

Houston will play the Los Angeles Angels on May 4 and 5 in the third MLB series in Monterrey this season. The Cincinnati Reds played the St. Louis Cardinals on April 13 and 14, and the Colorado Rockies and Arizona Diamondbacks played a pair of spring training games.

"It's the idea of the baseball commissioner [Rob Manfred]. We are going to expand the league in the future, and there are several candidates, possibly Las Vegas, possibly Montreal, Canada, but we are also exploring the option of Mexico and possibly also England or Europe," said Luhnow, who was born and raised in Mexico City. "I'm going to fight to get a team in Mexico because it would be ideal."

Luhnow told SportsCenter Mexico in Spanish that MLB projects to add more teams in the future.

"There are a lot of fans, and a lot of good players in Mexico," the Astros GM said. "It's a great opportunity for the league and also for the country."

Roberto Osuna, from Sinaloa, Mexico, is the first-place Astros closer. He joined the team last season in a trade with the Toronto Blue Jays.

"I know that [Astros president] Reid Ryan is keen on growing the number of Mexican ballplayers coming to the club," Luhnow said. "There's a lot of talent and a lot of players who don't get the opportunity to play in the U.S. I think that could change with scouts [and former MLB players] like Edgar González and Jaime García and others who will be involved in increasing the number of Mexican players to be successful in the big leagues. I'm going to support a lot of this."

"We have signed many Mexican players to our farm system, and hopefully in the future we will have many more," he said.