In Pittsburgh Thursday, the Tampa Bay Lighting’s Brayden Point netted a natural hat trick to lead the Bolts past the Penguins, 4-3.
Point’s hat trick was a natural and he accomplished the feat in 91 seconds; yes that’s 91 seconds.
That’s the sixth fastest hat trick in NHL history.
That’s pretty cool, but obviously, a couple 5-on-3 situations,” Point said. “You got to get put out in those spots, and guys found me. But it’s pretty cool. … That’s a first for me, but like I said, guys made good plays and I was able to score.”
Louis Domingue made 28 saves as the Bolts improved to 13-5-1.
The Penguins are 1-6-1 in their last eight games.
Sidney Crosby remains out with an injury.
“We talk after every game about our personnel, lineup decisions and what we think gives us the best chance to win,” Penguins head coach Mike Sullivan said. “We’ve tweaked lines and combinations to see if we could get a spark. … We’ve had some quality chances that we haven’t finished. If we finish on those over the last couple of weeks, maybe we’re not in the same position that we’re in.”
Patric Hornqvist had two goals and Phil Kessel scored for Pittsburgh.
“We overplayed them 5-on-5. We just gave them too many opportunities to grab the game on the power play. That’s it,” Kris Letangsaid.
Yanni Gourde also scored for the Lightning.
The Pens dropped to 7-7-3.
Point’s hat trick started with three seconds left in the first period and was completed at 1:28 of the middle frame.
“Somebody said it was one of the fastest in League history,” Lightning head coach Jon Cooper said. “It didn’t feel like it because he scored one of the goals in the first and two in the second. But he found a spot there and it’s just great to see because he’s such a hard worker and he plays the game the right way. You like to see those guys rewarded, and he was.”
[WATCH: All Lightning vs. Penguins highlights]
Matt Murray made 22 saves in the loss.
“I think we have to draw on all the positives,” Murray said. “I thought we were the better team 5-on-5. So we can definitely build off of that. Obviously, we know that we can’t take that many penalties, and if we do, we have to do a better job killing them off. But that was definitely the difference in the game.”
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