In 14 regular-season games against the Wings, Kucherov has six goals and four assists.
The Lightning also won their first game of the back-to-back, 4-0 in Brooklyn against the New York Islanders Monday night.
1. Darren Helm: Helm, who is tied for third on the team in scoring with seven points, was up-ended in the offensive zone by Lightning defenseman Nikita Nesterov at 5:11 of the third period. Helm appeared to land hard on his left arm. He went right to the dressing room and did not return. After the game, Wings coach Jeff Blashill said Helm has an upper-body injury and he expected him to be out "a little while." Helm had two shots, one hit and was 6-for-7 on face-offs before getting hurt.
Quotable: "That's a big one. He brings a lot to this team, let alone energy, tenacity, his ability to skate, probably better than anyone on the team. Larks would probably be the only guy to match him. So collectively we're going to have to find a way and that's what good teams do when a guy goes down. There's not one guy that comes in and replaces a Darren Helm, you got to it collectively within the group, shore up your game to be playing the best it possibly can until he gets back." - Steve Ott
2. Ryan Sproul: Sproul returned to the lineup after sitting out the last seven games as a healthy scratch. He replaced Niklas Kronwall, who was given a few days off to rest his knees. Sproul said before the game he wanted to do whatever he could to make it tough on the Wings to take him out of the lineup. At 7:12 of the third, Sproul scored his first NHL goal on the power play when he beat Tampa Bay goaltender Ben Bishop through the five-hole. Sproul also drew a penalty on Tyler Johnson and then assisted on Henrik Zetterberg's power-play goal at 9:38 of the third.
Quotable: "He can really shoot it. It's one of those shots that creates chaos because you don't know where it's going to go because it's so hard. When it hits people it doesn't just fall down. It goes lots of places. He's got a real good shot-first mentality. I thought he handled himself pretty well tonight." - Blashill
3. Steven Stamkos: Tampa Bay captain Steven Stamkos scored his ninth goal of the season at 6:09 of the first period to give the Lightning a 2-0 lead. The goal gave Stamkos 20 points for the season, tying him with Winnipeg's Mark Scheifele and Dallas' Tyler Seguin for the league lead. But at 9:51, while the Lightning were killing a penalty, Stamkos went down and had to leave the ice, appearing to favor his right knee. The Lightning announced in the second period that Stamkos would not return because of a lower-body injury.
Quotable: "He'll be evaluated again tomorrow. It's unfortunate that he couldn't come back, because he was helping us before he got hurt, but it is too early to speculate on anything right now." - Lightning coach Jon Cooper
