Hughes has 4 assists in return from injury, Canucks surge past Lightning

TAMPA -- Quinn Hughes had four assists in his return from injury, and the Vancouver Canucks scored six straight goals to win 6-2 against the Tampa Bay Lightning at Benchmark International Arena on Sunday.

The Vancouver captain missed the Canucks’ 4-3 overtime loss at the Carolina Hurricanes on Friday with an upper-body injury.

"I like the way he felt it and got into it, he started to get moving and you saw what he did," Canucks coach Adam Foote said. "He had a couple of nice plays. It was nice to have him back for sure."

Mackenzie MacEachern had a goal and an assist for the Canucks (9-9-2), who scored five times in the third period to end an 0-1-2 skid. Kevin Lankinen made 28 saves.

"They had 12 shots [in the first period], we were out of it, and it was 1-0," Foote said. "Good teams can come back from that. You're not going to feel good every night; there are 82 games. We were able to hang in there and sort it out as we went. That's a good sign."

Nikita Kucherov and Jake Guentzel scored for the Lightning (9-7-2), who defeated the Florida Panthers 3-1 on Saturday. Jonas Johansson made 12 saves.

"Losses are disappointing, but it's how you got there that you should be judging everything on," Tampa Bay coach Jon Cooper said. "And I have to give Vancouver all the credit in the world. They're down halfway through a hockey game, they're down 2-0, we probably had more goals than they had shots on net halfway through the game. And what did they do? They just kept going and they kept trying, understanding the game was 60 minutes, not 30. One team got comfortable, and in this league the second that happens, you're done."

Jake DeBrusk started the Vancouver comeback with a power-play goal to make it 2-1 at 9:26 of the second period. He poked in a loose puck off the rebound of a shot from Elias Pettersson.

"They were all over us in the first, we didn't like how it was," DeBrusk said. "Then comes the response in the second and in the third it just felt like everything was going in. We haven't had one of those periods as a team, so it's always exciting. It was good to see some guys get some goals."

Kiefer Sherwood tied the game 2-2 at 4:11 of the third period with a power-play goal that went off his stick and then the skate of J.J. Moser to get past Johansson.

Linus Karlsson gave the Canucks a 3-2 lead just 43 seconds later at 4:54 when he deflected in MacEachern’s backhand shot from above the hashmarks.

Drew O'Connor extended the Vancouver lead to 4-2 at 5:51 when he redirected a shot from Hughes into the net.

Charle-Edouard D'Astous appeared to have brought the Lightning back within a goal at 12:16 but it was overturned in the third period on a coach's challenge when video review determined Guentzel played the puck with a high stick earlier in the sequence that led to the goal.

MacEachern made it 5-2 at 13:52. Marcus Petterson added an empty-net goal at 16:57 for the 6-2 final.

"It speaks volumes of the character in the room," MacEachern said. "There is a lot of emotion obviously, so you have to kind of reinforce that you've got to play the right way because the right way got us to that situation. So we had to keep doing that. Just put pucks behind them and keep putting them on the net because that was the recipe to get a goal in the third."

Kucherov gave Tampa Bay a 1-0 lead at 19:25 with a one-timer from the right circle off a pass from Darren Raddysh.

Guentzel pushed the Lightning lead to 2-0 at 4:35 of the second period when he redirected a shot from Erik Cernak from the net front position.

"It's a full 60-minute game and you've got to be ready for all 60 minutes," Guentzel said. "Credit to them, they came out in the third and pushed and took over. We have to make sure we bear down in the third and play a full 60.

Vancouver was held to one shot in the first period.

"The first period was really good for us, we were playing good hockey," Cernak said. "I don't know what happened in the second and it's just unacceptable [in the third]. We just have to be better. In the first and second, we were owning the front of the net and then in the third we weren't strong enough. We didn't take the sticks away and they scored a couple of goals. Like I said, it's unacceptable."

NOTES: Lightning forward Brandon Hagel (concussion) returned to the lineup after missing a game and had an assist in 15:54 of ice time. ... Hughes led all skaters with 23:48 in ice time. … Hughes has seven assists in the past two games he's played in and 10 over his past five. ... Pettersson had two assists. … Guentzel has five points (three goals, two assists) in his past five games.