Stamkos' four points power Lightning against Maple Leafs

TORONTO -- Steven Stamkos had a goal and three assists for the Tampa Bay Lightning in a 5-3 win against the Toronto Maple Leafs at Scotiabank Arena on Thursday.

Stamkos has scored 14 points (four goals, 10 assists) during a nine-game personal point streak.
"You need your big guys to step up [when we have the number of injuries we do], and Stamkos has definitely done that," Lightning coach Jon Cooper said. "Good on him because when you have some of the injuries he's dealt with, that wears on you. … He was a big part of our Cup run last year, got time to get healthy over the summer, and he's really taken off again."
Ondrej Palat had two goals and an assist, and Andrei Vasilevskiy made 35 saves for the Lightning (17-5-4), who have won five in a row.
Anthony Cirelli was a late scratch and is day to day because of an upper-body injury that he aggravated in a 3-2 win against the Montreal Canadiens on Tuesday.
"It's definitely not easy, especially when you are losing the quality of players who aren't in the lineup for our group, but this group has never used that as an excuse," Stamkos said about the Lightning, who were also without forwards Brayden Point and Nikita Kucherov.
"Guys stepped up and it starts with our goalie, Andrei Vasilevskiy, [who] played great again. That's a really good team, and they're missing a couple [of] key guys, too, but they were playing some good hockey and we weathered the storm and played a pretty good third period I thought."

Auston Matthews had an assist to extend his point streak to eight games, Ondrej Kase scored twice, and Jack Campbell made 22 saves for the Maple Leafs (18-8-2), who were without Mitchell Marner for the fourth straight game because of a shoulder injury.
Palat put Tampa Bay ahead 3-2 at 4:02 of the second period when he redirected a pass from Stamkos in the slot, which went in off the Maple Leafs William Nylander's stick.
Taylor Raddysh made it 4-2 at 9:11 when he took a pass from Palat and shot past Campbell's glove in the slot.
"You can't make those kind of plays, those 5-on-5 goals we gave up. Those were inexcusable, those were gifts," Maple Leafs coach Sheldon Keefe said. "That's precisely what we talked about before the game started. You give that team and that goaltender that kind of support, it's going to be tough to climb out of.
"I didn't think we played a terrible game by any means. We worked hard and had our chances, but you just can't give that kind of stuff up. The decision-making and execution with the puck cost us."
Kase cut it to 4-3 at 9:36 of the third period when he put in the rebound of a shot from Jake Muzzin.
Palat shot into an empty net with 29 seconds left for the 5-3 final.
"I thought we controlled the game for the most part. I've just got to make a couple more saves to get us a win," Campbell said. "They're a great team, and they've proved it for so long now. I've just got to make a couple more saves."

The Maple Leafs went up 1-0 at 1:44 of the first period when Kase got to a loose puck at the side of the crease and shot over Vasilevskiy's blocker on the power play.
Pierre-Edouard Bellemare tied it 1-1 at 9:57 when he redirected a pass from Corey Perry, who had intercepted a pass from Muzzin just inside the Lightning blue line.
"It was a tough game for us. We made so many turnovers in the neutral zone," Kase said. "I feel that's where we lost the game. For us, the biggest issue was the turnovers."
Stamkos scored a power-play goal to make it 2-1 at 12:16 with a slap shot from the high slot.
Nylander tied it 2-2 with seven seconds left in the first when his shot from the sideboards deflected in off Bellemare's stick during a power play.
NOTES: Cooper won his 400th NHL game, all with the Lightning, becoming the fastest NHL coach to reach the milestone (659 games). ... Defenseman Morgan Rielly became the 21st player, and eighth defenseman, to play 600 games with the Maple Leafs. ... Matthews, who had his seven-game goal streak end, has scored 14 points (10 goals, four assists) during his point streak.