The two best teams in the Eastern Conference met Thursday night and the Tampa Bay Lightning skated off with a 4-1 win over the visiting Toronto Maple Leafs.
Andrei Vasilevskiy returned to the crease after missing 14 games with an injury; he made 48 saves to get the win.
“I tried to survive the first period and the second too,” Vasilevskiy said. “They’re a good team and they played very well. They were a very good test for us, and the guys scored important goals at the end of the second period.”
Alex Killorn, Tyler Johnson, Nikita Kucherov, and Anthony Cirelli scored for the Bolts.
Tampa improved to 25-7-1.
Kasperi Kapanen scored the lone goal for the Leafs.
“It was a great team that we just played against, but other than the little collapse in the second period, we were on top of them,” Kapanen said. “[Vasilevskiy] is a big guy, he covers a lot of the net, and he made those big saves.”
Toronto dropped to 21-10-1.
“[Vasilevskiy] played unbelievable,” Toronto’s Auston Matthews said. “In the end, he won them the game. I thought we played well. We had tons of chances. You know they are going to get chances, and they capitalized on a couple of theirs.”
[WATCH: All Maple Leafs vs. Lightning highlights]
Frederik Andersen made 17 saves in the loss.
“I thought we had good chances,” Maple Leafs head coach Mike Babcock said. “I liked our effort tonight. Obviously, the score is disappointing, but the way we played is not one bit disappointing.”
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