Lightning race out to big lead, defeat Maple Leafs in Game 4

TAMPA -- The Tampa Bay Lightning scored three goals in the first 7:58 and evened their Eastern Conference First Round series against the Toronto Maple Leafs with a 7-3 win in Game 4 at Amalie Arena on Sunday.

The best-of-7 series is tied 2-2. Game 5 is at Toronto on Tuesday.
"We scored early and often," Lightning coach Jon Cooper said. "Usually when you do that, you're putting the team on their heels and that was the game."

Ross Colton scored twice, and Andrei Vasilevskiy made 22 saves for Tampa Bay, the No. 3 seed in the Atlantic Division. Nikita Kucherov, Brandon Hagel and Victor Hedman each had two assists.
"Anytime you can hop out to an early lead, it's going to give our team some momentum," Colton said. "We knew they weren't going to go away. I think that's a credit to the guys in the locker room that instead of sitting back and let them take it to us we kind of say, 'Hey, let's get the next one and the next one after that.'"
William Nylander scored twice for Toronto, the No. 2 seed in the Atlantic. Jack Campbell allowed five goals on 16 shots before he was pulled in the second period. Erik Kallgren made 10 saves in relief.
"We were not at the required level," Toronto coach Sheldon Keefe said. "Tampa played at a higher level than us and got rewarded for it."
RELATED: [Complete Maple Leafs vs. Lightning series coverage\]
Steven Stamkos gave the Lightning a 1-0 lead at 1:00 of the first period with a one-timer, his first goal of the series after leading them with 42 in 81 regular-season games.
"The first goal has been important in this series so far," Stamkos said. "Other than that, we had a great start. That was one of our keys -- to come out and play the right way -- and we got rewarded for that."
Pierre-Edouard Bellemare made it 2-0 at 5:20 with a snap shot off a pass from Corey Perry, and Pat Maroon extended the lead to 3-0 at 7:58 on his own rebound.

Colton made it 4-0 at 3:17 of the second period with a slap shot that deflected off Campbell's glove, and Perry scored on a 5-on-3 power-play 2:08 later at 5:25 to make it 5-0.
"When we play like that ... we just have to find a way to do it the next game," Maroon said. "We know we can do it. We know what works. We know what's successful for our team and playing the right way and playing hard, and playing the right way works."
Nylander cut it to 5-1 on the power play at 2:27 of the third period, then one-timed a pass from John Tavares at 12:01 to make it 5-2.
Ondrej Palat scored an empty-net goal at 14:40 to make it 6-2, but Jake Muzzin cut it to 6-3 with a shot from the point at 15:41.
Colton scored an empty-net goal at 17:44 for the 7-3 final.
"We just wanted to build our game and be a lot better than we were for the first two periods," Tavares said. "Go out there, win a period, play good hockey. Play to the way we're capable of and start fresh going home."

NOTES: Tampa Bay went 1-for-8 on the power play; Toronto went 1-for-3. … Colton had five shots on goal and five hits. … Maple Leafs center Auston Matthews had an assist but was minus-3 and held to one shot on goal. … Hedman was plus-4 in 25:03 of ice time; Toronto defenseman Morgan Rielly was minus-4 in 20:36. … Maple Leafs defenseman Ilya Lyubushkin had a game-high eight hits in 14:52. … Tavares won 11-of-12 face-offs (92 percent).