Vasilevskiy's shutout streak ends, Lightning defeat Blackhawks in OT

CHICAGO --Andrei Vasilevskiy was denied his fourth straight shutout, but the Tampa Bay Lightning rallied for their sixth straight win, 3-2 in overtime against the Chicago Blackhawks at United Center on Thursday.

Alex Killorn scored on a redirection of Victor Hedman's shot with 0.1 seconds remaining in overtime, and Vasilevskiy made 35 saves for the Lightning (13-7-4), who tied their longest winning streak this season. Tampa Bay also won six in a row from Jan. 30-Feb. 9.
"I didn't really want to take it on my backhand, so I turned around and I just heard from the bench, 'Shoot the puck.' There wasn't a whole lot of time left," Hedman said. "[Killorn] did a good job in front and the puck went in, so big goal and yeah it was obviously very last second."
Ryan Carpenter and Alex DeBrincat scored for Chicago (12-7-5), which is 0-5-0 at home against Tampa Bay since Jan. 21, 2016. Kevin Lankinen made 31 saves.
The teams will play again here Friday.
"It's frustrating, for sure," Lankinen said. "I think we played a really good game as a team. We showed we can play well against top teams in this league. We had one of our best games in a while here. I think we were close. Obviously tough bounce at the end. It's frustrating."
Carpenter ended Vasilevskiy's streak at 228:09 with a shot from the left face-off circle that went off the right post for a shorthanded goal at 7:24 of the second period to give the Blackhawks a 1-0 lead. It was the first shorthanded goal the Lightning have allowed this season.

Vasilevskiy passed
John Grahame's
Lightning record of 202:46 without allowing a goal. Vasilevskiy had not given up a goal in 11 periods dating to the second period of a 4-2 win against the Carolina Hurricanes on Feb. 22.
"[Vasilevskiy] is a big part of our team and you know sometimes, not too often, you have to rely on him to keep us in games when we're not at our best," Hedman said. "He's been tremendous the whole season."
Patrick Kane's shot from the point deflected off DeBrincat's right skate for a 2-0 lead at 14:04.
Anthony Cirelli tipped Jan Rutta's shot from the right point for a shorthanded goal to make it 2-1 at 1:04 of the third period.
"It was big for us," Rutta said. "Obviously [we] just wanted to kill the penalty, take some momentum, [but] scoring a shorty like that, it was huge and helped us for sure."
Steven Stamkos tied it 2-2 at 2:55 when he dragged the puck around Kane and scored on a wrist shot from the slot.
"The expectations are so high for this team," said Stamkos, the Lightning captain. "Even when we are winning, sometimes you tend to nitpick a little bit and try to find some things we want to improve, which is not a bad thing.
"We're certainly accustomed to winning here and we want to win every night, but we've let it slide here a little bit I'd say the past five periods before this third period here where we were relying on maybe special teams or our goalie a little too much to win some hockey games."

DeBrincat hit the far post at 2:49 of overtime from the left circle, and Lightning defenseman Mikhail Sergachev hit the crossbar with a shot from the slot at 2:58.
"I saw that corner open. I thought it was in," DeBrincat said. "You know, some go in, some don't. [We've] got to keep battling. It's just the way it is. They hit a crossbar right after that, so I think it evened out."
NOTES: DeBrincat has four goals and six assists during a seven-game point streak. … The Lightning killed two penalties and are 18-for-18 over their past five games. … Tampa Bay defenseman Erik Cernak is day to day with an upper-body injury.