Burns: 3 Things we learned from a bounce-back win in Carolina

Prior to Monday's rematch against Carolina, the Tampa Bay Lightning talked about how there was no panic in their locker room after losing three of their last four games and getting shut out by the Hurricanes on Saturday.
But there was plenty of urgency.
Urgency to get back in the win column and remain among the leaders of the Central Division with the shortened runway of an abbreviated regular season. Urgency to get back to the style of play that served them so well during their run to the Stanley Cup. Urgency to remind the Central - and the rest of the NHL for that matter - who's the defending Cup champion and who remains the team to beat.
That urgency produced the grittiest victory of the young season, the Lightning defeating the Hurricanes 4-2. But even more important than the win, Tampa Bay proved to itself that if it sticks to what it does best and doesn't stray from its game plan, they're a very difficult team to defeat.

"We're a proud group, and we're not happy when we lose three out of the four games going into tonight," said Lightning defenseman Victor Hedman, who recorded a goal and assist for his 489th and 490th career points to pass Brad Richards and move into fifth place among the Lightning's all-time scoring leaders. "We talked about that the last few days was this is a challenge. We've got to see what we're made of. Are we going to go out there and try and chase and change what we do or are we going to stick to what we do well and do it to a T?
"I thought we answered that today."

1. UNDETERRED BY UNFORTUNATE START
From the opening whistle, the Lightning were a determined group Monday in Carolina.
They were on top of the Hurricanes, relentless in the way they pressured early.
After passing up numerous good scoring chances on Saturday, there was an emphasis on getting pucks to the net and creating a shot-scramble mentality.
For the first 10 minutes of the game, the Lightning sent wave after wave at the Hurricanes, putting them on their heels throughout.
It was as perfect a start as the Lightning could have without scoring a goal.
So, of course, Carolina was first to light the lamp, Jesper Fast scoring on a rebound from the edge of the crease on the Hurricanes' second shot of the game, the Lightning falling behind for the third-consecutive games against the Canes this season.
Two nights earlier, the Lightning unraveled a bit after giving up the opening goal. They started chasing the game, and that led to uncharacteristic mistakes that allowed the Hurricanes to build their lead.
But Monday, the Lightning were undeterred by the early goal against, viewing it as a minor setback on their path to victory. They continued to play the game they wanted and were hopeful eventually it would pay off.
And it did.
"Good teams (stick with it). It's what we didn't do the other night," Lightning head coach Jon Cooper said. "You're playing a good game and you go down and the other night we started making a bunch of mistakes and our problems compounded and we couldn't come back. This can be a cruel game. I thought we were the better team in the first period, and you come out of that down one, we had to believe in what we were doing and that we would have a chance to come back if we played the same way, and we did. And that was the big talk in between the first and the second was keep playing the same way and you'll be rewarded, and they were."
Early in the second period, the Lightning finally broke through after being shut out in two previous games against Carolina. On a power play, Steven Stamkos cranked a one-timer from the top of the left circle past Canes goalie James Reimer to draw the Lightning even and produce their first goal of the season against the Hurricanes.
"We did all the right things in the first period," Hedman said. "That's a test, and I thought we responded well. We got rewarded there in the second period. It was good to get that first goal. It's one of those games where I thought we had a great start and we just continued on and we played our game."
Having finally cracked Carolina's wall, the Lightning grew in confidence and continued to dig in. Less than five minutes later, Hedman received a pass from Mikhail Sergachev, took the open space in front of him, skated into the left circle and unleashed a wrist shot bar down past Reimer to give the Lightning a 2-1 lead and make the Hurricanes have to play from behind for the first time this season against the Bolts.

2. SWITCHING LINES GIVES THE BOLTS WINGS
The Lightning made one lineup change heading into Monday's contest.
Alex Barre-Boulet, called up to the taxi squad on February 15, was inserted into the lineup to make his NHL debut, replacing Gemel Smith, who was the choice to come out only because of the Lightning's roster situation, not because his play warranted.
Barre-Boulet was impressive in his first game and wasn't overwhelmed by the moment, even against a really good opponent in Carolina. He made plays when they were there. He created a couple prime scoring opportunities. And he played within the framework of Tampa Bay's system.
He certainly didn't look out of place, far from it in fact. He earned himself more ice time and games with his play.
"What a test to throw him in against Carolina, and I thought he passed with flying colors," Cooper said.
While Tampa Bay's lineup remained virtually unchanged, their lines looked nothing like they did through the first 15 games of the season. Cooper went with the following groups in an effort to spark his team after getting shut out Saturday:
Palat-Point-Coleman
Joseph-Johnson-Stamkos
Killorn-Gourde-Barre-Boulet
Maroon-Goodrow-Volkov
The ploy worked. The new combinations had a lot of jump and players meshed well together despite not having played together previously.
"They're still the same players," Hedman said. "We know one another and our lines have been through that before when we go with seven defensemen, the lines get mixed up a lot more. I thought everyone played great. (Barre-Boulet), his first NHL game, I thought he was outstanding. It was a lot of fun to see. We played with a lot of urgency. We played to our strengths. We didn't try and generate stuff that wasn't there. We took what was handed to us, and we worked hard for it. That's the way it has to be moving forward."
Cooper said he felt the lines had gotten a little stale and thought a shakeup might be in order.
"You're just trying to find some combinations of some guys that might spark something in them," he said. "When you're playing so many games so fast, you don't want guys to get in a rut. We knew this would happen. We knew at some point you're not going to keep all these lines together as we did a couple months ago. It's just the way it is. We threw BB in there, who we thought was great tonight and mixed a few things up and I thought it was like the boys drank a little Red Bull. They worked out for us."
The new lines gave the Lightning wings against the Canes. It'll be interesting to see if they stick when they start a back-to-back set against Carolina Wednesday at AMALIE Arena.

3. BEND BUT DON'T BREAK
Jesper Fast scored his second goal on a Carolina power play late in the second period to level the score 2-2 heading into what figured to be a frenetic third period.
The Lightning continued to play determined hockey, undeterred by giving up the lead.
Eight minutes into the third period, Ondrej Palat put the Bolts in front for good, his game-winning goal exemplifying the effort the Lightning played with all night. On the scoring play, Jan Rutta cranked a one-timer from above the right circle after receiving a pass from Brayden Point. Rutta's shot was partially blocked on its path toward goal and bounced out to the side of the net to Palat.
Palat went from his backhand to his forehand and tried to bring the puck out front for a shot at the far post. His initial attempt was denied by Reimer, but he continued to whack away at the puck. He spotted Point crashing down to the post and tried to slip a pass off to his right for him on the scramble. Instead, the puck caromed off the skate of Brady Skjei and redirected past Reimer, the greasiest of goals by Palat proving to be Carolina's demise. Just as a fluky goal on Saturday by the Hurricanes undid the Lightning.
"We played a simple game," Palat said. "We tried to not turn the puck over, and just forecheck, get the puck deep and shoot the puck."
Down by a goal and with less than 12 minutes remaining, Carolina threw everything it had at the Lightning net over the duration of the third period in an effort to tie the game again. Tampa Bay got in the way of as many shots as it could. And Andrei Vasilevskiy was there to clean up the rest, his most pivotal save coming against Andrei Svechnikov when the Russian forward got alone in the slot with a clear line of sight on the Lightning net, Vasilevskiy able to knock it aside with his glove.
Carolina put up 17 shots in the third period, the most the Lightning have surrendered in a period this season.
They didn't score on any of them.
"They pushed. You expect that. We bent and we didn't break," Cooper said. "We blocked a ton of shots, and when we didn't get them, Vasy was there. We had a couple pucks on our stick we could have got out. Could have executed a little bit better making them go 200 feet, but I liked our battle and in the end we get the empty-netter. It was one of those situations when you're playing good teams, you're going to get leaned on. I like the fact that we didn't break."