In Tampa, the Lightning’s Anthony Cirelli scored hear the midway point of the third pored to snap a 2-2 tie and send Tampa Bay to a 3-2 win over the New Jersey Devils on Thursday night.
“We just wanted to get a lot of shots on net, get a lot of traffic in front,” Cirelli said. “We had three pretty grimy goals where guys were getting to the net and making plays.”
The Lightning improved to 29-10-5 with the win.
“If you’re not going to go to those areas to score and compete in those areas, you’re not going to win,” Tampa Bay head coach Jon Cooper said. “You get into these one-goal games, you’re going to need those, and we had just enough tonight.”
Andrei Vasilevskiy made 31 saves in teh Bolts win.
Damon Severson and scored for New Jersey.
New Jersey dropped to 15-22-5.
“I thought our puck movement was excellent,” New Jersey head coach Lindy Ruff said. “Speed going up ice, skated really well, our execution with the puck movement was real good. Their goalie made some big-time saves, even at the start of the third period. But there was a lot to like inside the game.”
Alex Killorn and Mathieu Joseph also scored for Tampa.
New Jersey’s Jack Hughes had a goal for New Jersey in the third period to tie the game, 2-2.
“They’re the best team in the League until someone knocks them off,” Hughes. “They know how to win. We’ll get to that point one day. That’s a better hockey team than us, but we played a really good game tonight and it’s disappointing we didn’t get two points.”
Jon Gillies made 32 saves in the New Jersey loss.
“We did exactly what we didn’t need to do,” Hughes said. “Obviously we gave up the penalty shot and we gave up the goal too. It’s not very good out of us, which is disappointing because we’ve been really good on the power play as of late. That was a chance for us to make a huge difference.”
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