The coach may be new, but some things haven’t changed in the playoff rivalry between Detroit and Tampa.
One year after getting torched by Tyler Johnson and his linemates in the playoffs, Johnson picked up where he left off. Johnson set up Alex Killorn’s game-winning goal, and assisted on one of Nikita Kucherov’s two goals in a 3-2 win in Game 1 of the Eastern Conference Quarterfinal series. Game 2 is Friday night in Tampa.
Killorn’s goal came at 8:52 of the third, about 90 seconds after Victor Hedman scored what he thought was the tie-breaking goal. However, after Detroit challenged the call, Jonathan Drouin was ruled offside for entering the zone too early.
Kucherov opened the scoring for the Lightning at 6:23 of the first period from Johnson and Killorn.
The Red Wings came back quickly in the second period. Mike Green scored from Tomas Tatar and Danny DeKeyser at 2:11, and took the lead less than 2 minutes later when Justin Abdelkader redirected Kyle Quincey’s shot from the blue line.
Kucherov knotted the game up at 2 at 9:29 of the second period from Braydon Coburn and Nikita Nesterov.
Ben Bishop picked up the win for Tampa with 34 saves. Jimmy Howard made 31 saves in the loss.
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