Bruins Surrender Three Goals in Third, Fall to Tampa

TAMPA -- Darren Raddysh broke a tie late in the third period, and the Tampa Bay Lightning rallied to defeat the Boston Bruins 3-1 at Benchmark International Arena on Saturday.

Raddysh scored his 21st goal to set a Lightning record for the most by a defenseman in a season. The previous mark of 20 was shared by Dan Boyle (2006-07) and Victor Hedman (2021-22).

Charle-Edouard D'Astous and Nikita Kucherov also scored for the Lightning (48-22-6), who have won four of their past five games and went 5-1-1 on a seven-game homestand. Andrei Vasilevskiy made 21 saves. 

Earlier Saturday, Tampa Bay clinched a berth in the Stanley Cup Playoffs for the ninth consecutive season when the Detroit Red Wings lost 4-1 at the New York Rangers. The Lightning lead the Buffalo Sabres by two points for first place in the Atlantic Division.

Casey Mittelstadt scored, and Jeremy Swayman made 20 saves for the Bruins (43-26-8), who have lost two straight after a four-game winning streak. They lead the Ottawa Senators by six points for the first wild card into the playoffs from the Eastern Conference and trail the Montreal Canadiens by four points for third place in the Atlantic Division.

"I didn't like the first few minutes. We gave up two odd-man rushes. ... We played a pretty good game, we really did," Boston coach Marco Sturm said. "A couple of bad bounces. We didn't get the puck in on the second one and all of sudden a good team like that, they take advantage."

Raddysh gave Tampa Bay a 2-1 lead at 14:29 with a wrist shot from a sharp angle in the right face-off circle that got under Swayman's right shoulder.

Kucherov added an empty-net goal at 18:27 for the 3-1 final.

"I thought we had a lot of positives for our group. Sometimes you don't get the results," Swayman said. "Our team shouldn't be hanging their heads. A lot of great things came out of tonight's game and that's what we should be focused on."

Mittelstadt gave Boston a 1-0 lead at 6:47 of the second period after Viktor Arvidsson won a puck battle along the right wall and found Mittelstadt open for a wrist shot from between the circles.

"We had a few chances, even in the first, but I also thought the power play needed to step up,” Sturm said of Boston going 0-for-4 with the man-advantage. “It didn't really give us a whole lot of grade-A chances. We were fine, though. We were still good enough today. But those little details, they matter, and those details have been hurting us for two games in a row."

D'Astous tied it 1-1 at 2:13 of the third. After his initial shot from the top of the slot was blocked, he buried his own rebound from a sharp angle on the left side.