Lightning recover from blown lead to beat Stars in shootout
The Lightning saw a two-goal lead evaporate in the final three minutes of regulation Tuesday night in Dallas, forcing them to dig deep in a game they dominated most of the way.
Lightning goaltender Andrei Vasilevskiy turned away two of three shots in the shootout, blocking Alexander Radulov’s backhand shot to seal a 4-3 win over the Stars at American Airlines Arena.
Rookie Ross Colton and Brayden Point scored on their shootout opportunities to give the Lightning the edge.
Tampa Bay took a 3-1 lead late into the third period before Dallas scored two goals with an extra attacker and an empty net.
Dallas captain Jamie Benn’s goal with 2:06 left in regulation made it a one-goal game, and Radulov’s score with 85 seconds left to send the game into three-on-three overtime.
Vasilevskiy, who saw just six shots on goal in the first period, made three big saves in overtime.
In Dallas for little more than 24 hours — and playing their second of five games in seven days — the Lightning skated with tremendous energy out of the gate against their opponent from last year’s Stanley Cup final. They possessed the puck well, moved directly up the ice, passed efficiently, pressured Dallas goaltender Jake Oettinger and saw solid play across all four lines.
They played arguably their best 20 minutes of hockey this season in the first period. The only problem was they had just one goal to show for it.
Despite outshooting the Stars 18-6 in the period, the Lightning went into the first intermission with just a one-goal lead on Point’s 11th goal of the season just under four minutes into the game.
After the Stars took momentum in the second period — tying the game on Miro Heiskanen’s power-play goal — the Lightning received a big boost from their fourth line on Mathieu Joseph’s go-ahead goal with 5:40 left in the period.
Pat Maroon won a battle for the puck along the boards behind the net and flicked a nice pass to the slot, where Joseph rocketed a one-timer into the back of the goal.
With 8:11 left in the game, Victor Hedman fed Steven Stamkos for a one-timer from the left circle to give the Lightning a two-goal cushion. The assist gave Hedman 500 career points, making him the first Lightning defenseman to reach that mark.
The Lightning knew the Stars would come out with more determination after the first period, and they did, putting more pressure on Vasilevskiy.
Dallas missed a tremendous scoring chance when Nick Caamano grabbed the puck coming out of the penalty box at the end of Tampa Bay’s first power play and got loose on a breakaway, but he shot high over the crossbar.
Vasilevskiy got busier as the night went on, though he couldn’t do much about the Stars’ first goal, a shot from the point that Joe Pavelski deflected and bounced around before Heiskanen cleaned it up on an empty right side of the goal.
Tampa Bay’s first goal was the perfect example of everything the Lightning were doing well in the opening period. Anthony Cirelli rimmed the puck around to Ondrej Palat at the far blue line, and Palat made a tremendous cross-ice pass through the neutral zone to Point, who beat Oettinger with a backhanded shot on a breakaway.
Vasilevskiy not only continued his domination of the Stars, but extended his win streak to nine games, tied for the second-longest streak of his career. Vasilevskiy, who had 24 saves, hasn’t lost a game since Feb. 20 at Carolina.
Heiskanen’s score was the first Dallas goal against Vasilevskiy in 206 minutes, 54 seconds dating back to Game 5 of the Stanley Cup final. He has never had a regulation loss against Dallas in the regular season, going 8-0-3 against the Stars.
Contact Eduardo A. Encina at eencina@tampabay.com. Follow @EddieInTheYard.
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