A flurry of chances was accompanied by a flurry of goals for the Tampa Bay Lightning on Tuesday in a 6-1 win over the Pittsburgh Penguins at AMALIE Arena.
Anthony Cirelli scored twice in the first period, Brandon Hagel and Ryan McDonagh both had a goal and an assist. Brayden Point also scored for Tampa Bay. Andrei Vasilevskiy finished with 14 saves.
Nikita Kucherov had a goal and two assists to lead the Tampa Bay Lightning over the Pittsburgh Penguins 6-1 on Tuesday night.
Anthony Cirelli got the scoring started for Tampa Bay on Tuesday, the first of four goals for the home team in the first period. Ryan McDonagh made it 2-0 before Cirelli’s second of the game pushed the lead to 3-0.
Brayden Point rounded out a busy first period on offense with his 4-0 goal with four minutes left. The Lightning had two more goals in the second period to hit six goals.
Tristan Jarry started in net for the Penguins but was pulled 16 minutes into the first period after allowing four goals on seven shots. Alex Nedeljkovic stopped 18 shots in relief. Bryan Rust scored for Pittsburgh.
The Lightning scored four goals in the first period in the span of 3:47 to race out to the lead and never looked back.
Goalie Andrei Vasilevskiy made 15 stops for the win.
The Lightning are now 41-25-5 this season and host Utah Hockey Club on Thursday.
Takeaways
Penguins: C Evgeni Malkin was a late scratch with an undisclosed upper-body injury. … Sidney Crosby extended his point streak to eight games with an assist and needs one more point to set an NHL record for 20-consecutive seasons averaging a point-per-game.
Lightning: Cirelli appeared in his 500th career regular-season game. … Kucherov reached the 100-point plateau for the fifth time in his career. … D Erik Cernak left in the first period and did not return with an undisclosed injury.
Key moment
Kucherov appeared to be injured when he was run into the side of the net by Ryan Graves and immediately headed down the tunnel. While Kucherov missed the start of the ensuing power-play chance, he returned to the ice and scored Tampa Bay’s fifth goal of the night with 8 seconds left on the man advantage.
Key stat
Kucherov is the 10th player in NHL history to record three-consecutive seasons with at least 70 assists, joining Connor McDavid as the only other active player to accomplish the feat.
