In Tampa, the Lightning’s Steven Stamkos scored with five seconds left in regulation to tie their match with the visiting Boston Bruins on Monday night, forcing extra time.
“I know ‘Kuch’s’ abilities, I see Kuch going to the backhand, there’s only maybe one other guy in the League that can make that pass,” said Stamkos. “I know it’s coming, or he’s attempting to do it and if it gets through I’ve got a good chance to get it on net. Just a world-class play.”
In the extra session, Brandon Hagel nit for the game-winner at 1:19 for a 5-4 win.
“I’ll give some credit to practice,” Hagel said. “We’ve been working on it a few times. It’s big stringing three together. We want to keep it rolling, but it’s one day at a time and one game at a time.”
Jonas Johansson made 22 saves in the win..
“We’ve kind of flipped the table here these last couple of games,” Tampa Bay coach Jon Cooper said. “You want to have the ability to come from behind, but you don’t want to make it a practice of falling behind all the time. That’s happened to us the last couple of games.”
The Lightning improved to 9-6-4 off their third straight win.
“For the most part I thought we didn’t turn the puck over, we made the hard plays,” Stamkos said. “And we made the hard plays at the right time. We have some guys that are stepping up and getting more confident and comfortable.”
The two teams traded goals in the opening stanza with Tampa taking a 1-0 lead on a strike by Tanner Jeannot at 6:39.
Boston replied with a goal from Pavel Zacha at 9:55 to knot it at 1-1.
“I think we need to develop a little more poise and understanding of time and score and how to close out games,” Boston coach Jim Montgomery said. “Obviously we gave up two leads in the third and you never want to do that.”
In the middle frame, Tampa reclaimed the lead, 2-1 on a power play marker from Nicholas Paul at 19:30.
In the third period, Boston took a 3-2 lead on a pair of goals to start the period, with David Pastrnak scoring at 6:26 for a 2-2 tie.
John Beecher put the Bruins up, 3-2, at 7:47.
Tampa rallied to tie it, 3-3, on a goal from Austin Watson at 8:44.
“The effort level from the guys these last few games … they’re being rewarded for it,” Cooper said. “It’s not always perfect … but I’m just really happy for the guys.”
The Bruins dropped to 13-1-3.
Boston’s Charlie Coyle scored at 16:09 of the third to push the Bruins back in front, 4-3.
“It’s a shame we couldn’t pull it off,” Coyle said. “We had a couple of third-period leads and we can’t afford to give those up. Good teams are going to keep battling like that, but we’re a good team too. We have to make sure that we play the right way and are doing the right things, especially with a lead.”
Jeremy Swayman made 41 saves in the loss.
“I loved how resilient we were,” Montgomery said. “We just kept coming back. The belief on the bench was always that we were going to be able to win that game.”
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