Stamkos Spoils Drouins Return to the Oil Can

All Photos by Travis Failey

Tampa – The story coming into Thursday night’s game was the trade that brought Mikhail Sergachev to the Lightning for Jonathan Drouin but the story quickly became the Steven Stamkos Show as the Tampa Bay Lightning beat the Montreal Canadiens 3-1 on Thursday night at Amalie Arena.

Stamkos had two goals including one right before intermission in the second period on a dazzling backhand pass from Nikita Kucherov to finally put Tampa Bay on the board and tie the score at one.

Both teams struggled to put the puck in the net in the first period as the goaltending on this night was up for the challenge, especially Andrei Vasilevskiy who had 31 saves vs the Habs. Vasilevskiy picked up his twenty-fifth win of the season with some outstanding saves on the night. The only goal he gave up was a power play tip-in from Brendan Gallagher early on in the second period.

Tampa Bay took control of the game just thirty seconds into the third period with Braydon Point scoring to put the bolts up 2-1 it was point’s 15^th goal of the season and seventh game-winning goal this year. The lightning struggled on the power play all night going 1-6 but when they got a key 5-3 situation once again Stamkos came through to put the game out of reach scoring on Carey Price. Stamkos in his last 12 games he has five goals and six assists.

As for Drouin he had a quiet night with only three shots and finished at a minus one. When these two teams meet again, the story will once again be on the trade between both of these teams. On this night and so far this season, it certainly seems as if the Lightning got the better end of the deal. The Lightning are now 27-7-2 and will face the Philadelphia Flyers on Friday night at Amalie Arena.

Peter Blake