The Tampa Bay Lightning rallied from a pair of one goal deficits and then scored the only goal in the second round of the shootout on Thursday night taking a 4-3 win over the Boston Bruins at TD Garden in Boston.
Tampa Bay dominated play early and had eight of the first 12 shots on goal but couldn’t get one past Boston goalie Tuuka Rask. The Bruins got on the board first at 9:34 on the powerplay. Torey Krug took a shot from the point that was deflected away in front bouncing to Patrice Bergeron in the slot who made a quick back hand feed to a wide open David Pastrnak who one timed it in from the left faceoff dot. A defensive breakdown though late in the period allowed Tampas Braydon Point to break in and roof one over the shoulder of Rask with less than second to play to tie the game 1-1.
Patrice Bergeron regained the lead for the hosts at 7:26 of the second again on a powerplay. Bergeron received a pass tape to tape from Brad Marchand to the left of Tampa goalie Andrei Vasilevskiy and tapped it in for his second of the season. Tampa Bay responded just over three minutes later when Mathieu Joseph buried a rebound of a Alex Killorn shot that Rask couldn’t handle at 10:32 to make it 2-2. Kevin Shattenkirk gave the Lightning their first lead of the night wristing one in from between the faceoff circles that eluded Rask at 15:13 of the third period. Boston had the answer as Pastrnak did it again firing a shot from the right of the net that deflected off Shattenkirk and into the net on the powerplay at 16:55 that would send the game to overtime. It was the sixth goal in two games for Pastrnak and his eighth of the early season.
Boston (5-1-1) had the two best chances of overtime as Matt Grzelcyk had a breakaway and Sean Kuraly hit one off the post. The game went to a shootout where Steven Stamkos scored the game winner in the second round to allow Tampa Bay to take the extra point. The Lightning are now 4-2-1.
Rask made 33 saves in the loss. Pastrnak had two goals and an assist to lead the way for the second straight game. Bergeron had a goal and an assist, while both Marchand and Krug had two assists each. Boston scored all three goals on the powerplay going 3-5 on the night, while Tampa Bay was 0-4. Vasilevskiy made 34 saves in the win. Point was the only Lightning with multiple points with a goal and an assist. The Bruins return to action Saturday when they travel to Toronto to battle the Maple Leafs at 7 p.m.
