In Buffalo, the on again, off again play from the Tampa Bay Lightning was on for Tuesday night in a 6-1 win over the Sabres.
Nikita Kucherov hit for a hat trick in the victory.
“He’s a special player and I think we all see that,” Lightning head coach Jon Cooper said. “His vision and his anticipation of what goes on, he’s steps ahead of everybody out there. His timing’s still coming back, he’ll be the first I think to tell you that. … This game’s tough and he’s being rewarded. You’re seeing these points but it’s the little, subtle things he’s doing in the D zone, in the breakouts and all those other things that we as coaches really respect and appreciate that he’s doing 200 feet [down] the ice. Hopefully he only gets better from here.”
The he Lightning improved to 24-9-5.
Andrei Vasilevskiy made 17 saves in the Tampa win.
Vinnie Hinostroza scored the Sabres lone goal.
The Sabres dropped to 10-19-6.
“It was our own fault,” the Sabres’ Zemgus Girgensons said. “We gave some high-danger scoring chances to one of the top scoring teams. It was our own fault. At this point it was just mental to get back into it. It was a tough night. That’s not how we want to play.”
The Lightning took a 2-0 lead off strikes from Ondrej Palat and Anthony Cirelli.
Kucherov added two goals and Steve Stamkos scored for a 5-0 lead.
“We knew we didn’t play our best the last game so we wanted to come out and get a good start, and I thought we did,” Stamkos said.
Kucherov completed his hat trick in the third period.
Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen got the start for Buffalo and surrendered four goals and made five saves. He departed the ice in the first period with an apparent injury.
Malcolm Subban made 23 saves in relief.
“Obviously, we needed a better effort,” Buffalo head coach Do Granato said. “It was individual, but it was collective. And you could tell they were ready for us. They were ultra-sharp tonight and they executed. Obviously, they got a full lineup back with Kucherov coming back and they’re healthy right now and they’re feeling it. You could see that tonight. We didn’t execute, obviously, the way we wanted. No excuses. We weren’t sharp and we paid the price.”
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