With the Tampa Bay Lightning trailing the Vancouver Canucks 2-0 on Saturday, Nikita Kucherov decided enough was enough. A spirited effort from No. 86 included back-to-back goals to spark a 4-2 comeback victory.
Kucherov’s latest performance was his first multi-goal game of the season, helping the Lightning improve to 6-2-0 as the team remains unbeaten (5-0-0) at Benchmark International Arena.
“It was good,” Kucherov said of the team’s response to a 2-0 deficit. “We stuck to the system and when you’re putting pucks to the net, good things happen.”
That shooting mentality led to numerous first-period scoring chances and 27 shot attempts for the home team. Despite that good start, the Canucks were the first team to score with a Linus Karlsson slap shot from the right circle with 4:28 left in the opening frame.
Canucks goalie Kevin Lankinen played his part in the period, too—Gage Goncalves set up Jake Guentzel for a prime chance at the right post nine minutes into the game, but Lankinen denied the look with his pads. He made another sliding stop on an open Victor Hedman chance from distance and finished with 11 saves in the first period.
After Vancouver extended its lead to 2-0 with an Elias Pettersson power-play goal, Kucherov and the Lightning solved Lankinen with a power-play goal of their own.
Brandon Hagel got the puck atop the left faceoff circle and feathered a pass to Kucherov on the right side. His initial shot was stopped by Lankinen’s glove before the puck bounced back to him, and he made no mistake on the second chance in the sixth minute of the period.
Defenseman Charle-Edouard D’Astous played on that top power play on Saturday, and the team scored on their lone power play chance.
“The statistics will sit here and say we're sitting at the bottom of the league on the power play, but I do believe we've been a little unfortunate,” coach Jon Cooper said. “I think we've missed some chances that would have been no-brainer goals for us, so the statistic’s probably a little skewed. It was time to try some new things, and I thought we didn't get many chances, but I thought they made the best of it.”
Kucherov then tied the game on a faceoff play five minutes later, accepting a won draw by Brayden Point atop the left circle and snapping the puck inside the right post for the 2-2 goal.
“I think Pointer’s been great this season,” Kucherov said of the play. “I have a lot of confidence in him, and if he’s in the dot I have a lot of confidence that he’s going to win, and fortunate for me that that went in.”
Kucherov led the team with seven shots on goal and has 15 over his last two games. The team has emphasized a shooting mentality this season, and Kucherov has been one of the team’s leaders in that department.
His latest multi-point outing pushed him closer to tying Steven Stamkos (1,137 points) as the franchise’s all-time leading scorer, as he’s now three points away.
"He's really got that shooter's mentality going on right now, and I love it,” Cooper said of Kucherov. “That’s how pucks go in the net, especially for guys like him. I was a little bummed that the one from center ice didn't go in, it would have been pretty cool to see the hats come down. But I like the shooting mentality he's got going on right now. It's great.”
The Lightning built on the momentum two minutes into the third period, taking their first lead of the game when Guentzel one-timed a pass from Charle-Edouard D’Astous at the blue line and the puck deflected off the stick of a Canucks forward and into the top right corner of the net.
Another faceoff win extended the lead late, as Pontus Holmberg won a puck battle on an offensive zone draw before firing a shot through Lankinen with four minutes remaining for the 4-2 final score.
Tampa Bay won 62% of their draws two nights after Cooper said the team needed to be better in the faceoff circle.
“I don't want to nitpick our team as the season’s still in its infancy, but you find little holes in your game and we were really not happy with our faceoffs last game. We call it the line of scrimmage, and you always look at these like it's just the center that gets the win or the loss, but really, what are your linemates doing? When they're helping you, that turns whatever could have been like a 54% night into a 63% night because everybody's engaged. That was clearly a point of emphasis for us, and they did a good job tonight.”
Tampa Bay finished the night with a 35-14 advantage in shots on goal and a 73-51 lead in shot attempts.
The team now hits the road for three games, beginning with a 10:30 p.m. ET puck drop against Vegas on Tuesday.
Benjamin’s Three Stars:
- Nikita Kucherov, TBL (2 goals)
- Jake Guentzel, TBL (Goal, assist)
- Brayden Point, TBL (2 assists)
