The Tampa Bay Lightning extended their point streak to 12 games and maintained the top spot in the Atlantic Division on Friday but saw their NHL-best 11-game win streak come to a close in St. Louis.
Tampa Bay is now 29-13-4 this season after fighting back from a 2-0 deficit to force the St. Louis Blues and goalie Joel Hofer into a shootout on Friday. Despite not winning, coach Jon Cooper’s team will take the standings point and move on.
“We’ve put ourselves in position to win the past 12 games, and for 11 straight of them, we did. Tonight we had ample opportunities to pull this one out,” Cooper said. “A puck bounce here, a big save, but I liked our game, and we’ll look at the tape…But you’re down two on the road and you come back and get at least one point, so I’m pretty proud of the guys.”
Hofer was the busiest Blue on Friday, finishing with 34 saves and halting all three Lightning shootout attempts on a night the Bolts outshot the Blues 36 to 21.
The Lightning had the bulk of the chances and kept the Blues away from their net for much of the first period, but it was St. Louis who struck first. The Blues scored two goals in 30 seconds to steal a 2-0 lead despite being outshot 9-3 through the opening 15 minutes.
An unlucky bounce helped the Blues find the back of the net with 2:57 remaining in the first period. The Lightning poked the puck off the stick of Jordan Kyrou in the high slot, but the puck made its way to an open Jake Neighbours at the right post, where the latter buried his shot for the 1-0 lead.
Thirty seconds later, Pavel Buchnevich forced a turnover on a Lightning breakout and passed to Nick Bjugstad, whose shot from the top of the left faceoff circle made it 2-0.
Thanks to the power play, the visitors needed only 62 seconds of game time in the second period to tie the game.
Tampa Bay took advantage of a 12-second 5-on-3 power play chance to cut into the lead, as Nikita Kucherov one-timed a shot from the right faceoff dot through Blues goalie Joel Hofer at the midway point of the middle frame.
Sixty-two seconds later, Oliver Bjorkstrand tied the game on another power-play goal. Darren Raddysh fed Kucherov in the right circle once again, and Kucherov quickly tapped the puck to Bjorkstrand in the bumper position at the right hashmark. His shot beat Hofer up high to make it 2-2 with 9:59 left in the period.
The third period featured more back-and-forth action, and both goalies were forced into making saves in the overtime period. Neither team could find the game-winning goal until the shootout, when Kyrou was the only player to score on a deke to his backhand.
“The power play, we got the two goals and that was positive,” Bjorkstrand said. “Other than that, we played some good hockey throughout the game. In the end we just couldn’t get it done, so we can work on that, but we can take some things from it.”
Kucherov’s goal and assist co-led the Lightning alongside Raddysh’s two assists, and Vasilevskiy finished with 19 saves and a .905 save percentage.
The Lightning can start a new win streak when they close their road trip with a 2 p.m. game against the Dallas Stars this Sunday.
“We’ve got a point streak going here and we can look to build off that,” Raddysh said. “We’ve got a good test on Sunday against Dallas, so we’ve got to get ready for that.”
Benjamin’s Three Stars:
- Joel Hofer, STL (34 saves)
- Nikita Kucherov, TBL (Goal, assist)
- Jordan Kyrou, STL (Shootout goal, assist)
