The Tampa Bay Lightning earned their franchise best 50th win and 108th point of the season as they beat the Boston Bruins 3-2 in a shootout tonight at a sold out Amalie Arena. Jonathan Marchessault and Vladislav Namestnikov scored in regulation for the Lightning. Goalie Ben Bishop stopped 36 of 38 shots to win his franchise record 40th game of the year.
The scoreless first period saw the desperate Bruins outshoot the Lightning 10-6. The Bolts killed off two penalties and were 0-1 on the power play. Vladislav Namestnikov was injured in a collision with the Bruins Adam McQuaid. McQuaid looked to get a forearm or elbow up around Namestnikov’s head and was penalized. There was also some knee-to-knee contact. Namestnikov returned in the second period.
The second period was more like a playoff game as the intensity and physical play picked up.
At 5:08 of the period, the just recalled Jonathan Marchessault scored his first NHL goal with a blazing wrist shot that beat Bruins goalie Tuukka Rask short-side high to give the Lightning a 1-0 lead. Marchessault was coming off a four point game with the Crunch last night.
Jonathan Marchessault holding the puck from his first career NHL goal. #TBLightning pic.twitter.com/gkFXQUuZXK
— Bryan Burns (@BBurnsNHL) April 12, 2015
//platform.twitter.com/widgets.jsJust 52 seconds later, Boston’s Loui Eriksson tied the game at one when he found a rebound and batted it out of the air past Ben Bishop. For Eriksson, it was his 22nd goal of the season and was assisted by Chris Kelly and Dennis Seidenberg. Shots for the second period were tied at ten. Right after the Bolts killed off a Namestnikov tripping penalty early in the third period, Nikita Nesterov scored on a shot from the point that went off a Bruin and past Rask to make it 2-1. The goal, scored at 5:12 was Nesterov’s third of the season and second in the last two games. It was assisted by Matt Carle and Marchessault.
HIGHLIGHT: Nikita Nesterov fires a blue line shot past Boston Bruins goalie Tuukka Rask. http://t.co/TXZSKhrJ02 — X – @TBLightning (@TBLightning) April 12, 2015
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Brad Marchand scored his 24th of the year, assisted by Torey Krug at 18:54 to force overtime.
Shots for the period were 12-7 in favor of Boston.
In the scoreless overtime the shots were 5-1 in favor of the Bruins.
Bolts defenseman Victor Hedman scored the only goal of the shootout to give the Lightning a 3-2 win.
Earlier in the evening, Pittsburgh defeated Buffalo, thus eliminating the Bruins.
The Lightning will host the Detroit Red Wings, likely on Thursday night in Game 1 of the Eastern Conference quarterfinals. The Bolts went 2-1-1 in the season series. They won 4-3 (shootout), 5-1 and 3-1, and lost 4-0.
Look for our extensive Round 1 Preview on Wednesday.
Round one of the Eastern Conference playoffs looks like this: Lightning vs. Red Wings, Canadiens vs. Senators, Rangers vs. Penguins and Islanders vs Capitals.
Jason Garrison (upper body), Braydon Coburn (lower body), Alex Killorn (undisclosed), Jonathan Drouin (illness) and Andrej Sustr (upper body) were the scratches.
(Feature Photograph/Getty Images)
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