The Backcheck: Bolts win their third-straight heading into the break

There’s something about 6-3.

The Tampa Bay Lightning skated to a third-straight victory Saturday night in a 6-3 win over the New Jersey Devils at AMALIE Arena, marking the third-consecutive contest the Bolts have won by a score of 6-3.

After neither team was able to find the back of the net in the opening 20 minutes, the Lightning opened the scoring just 1:09 into the second period when Nick Paul positioned himself in front of the net and redirected a shot from the point off the stick of Victor Hedman that got past Vitek Vanecek and made it a 1-0 game.

The Bolts built on that momentum and grabbed a 2-0 lead a little over nine minutes later when Brandon Hagel jumped on a rebound in front off another shot from Hedman and shoveled the puck past Vanecek for his 15^th goal of the season.

Former Tampa Bay forward Ondrej Palat got New Jersey on the board at the 2:49 mark of the third period to make it a one-goal game, but as we’ve seen throughout the past 10 games, the Lightning didn’t blink.

Steven Stamkos punched right back for the Bolts and restored the two-goal lead just 60 seconds later, crashing the net and jamming home a rebound off a shot from Nick Perbix to make it 3-1.

A little less than four minutes later, Jesper Bratt got the Devils back within one and made it a 3-2 game with 12:41 remaining in regulation.

But, again, the Lightning had an answer. After Kevin Bahl turned the puck over in his own zone, Brayden Point quickly jumped on it and fired a shot past Vanecek to put the Bolts up 4-2 with 6:08 remaining.

Refusing to go down without a fight, New Jersey pulled Vanecek for a sixth attacker and got back within one at the 17:22 mark of the third with Tyler Toffoli scoring his 21^st goal of the season at the side of the net.

But the Lightning stuck to their game and found the empty net just 59 seconds later with Hagel netting his second goal of the night. Point added another empty-net goal 45 seconds later to wrap up the 6-3 win.

Andrei Vasilevskiy made 21 saves on 24 shots against, sending the Lightning to the All-Star break with wins in eight of its last nine contests.

Bolts by the Numbers

• Nick Paul scored the game-opening goal and added an assist to bring his point total to 27 this season (13-14— 27)...Paul has tallied four points (2-2—4) over his last five games.
• Victor Hedman recorded three assists and became the fourth active NHL defenseman to log 700 career points. Hedman is just the 29^th defenseman in NHL history to record 700 career points.
• Hedman is up to 50 points on the season (9-41—50) and has now recorded eight career 40-assist seasons, tied with Martin St. Louis for the most in Lightning franchise history.
• Hedman has found the scoresheet in four consecutive games (1-5—6) and six of his last seven contests (3-8—11).
• Nikita Kucherov recorded two assists for his 26^th multi-point game of the season and regained sole possession of the most points in the NHL (32—53—85). Kucherov has points in four straight games (4-6—10).
• Brandon Hagel scored two goals and is up to 43 points on the season (16-27—43). Hagel has picked up points in three straight games (3-2—5) and has found the scoresheet in nine of his last 11 contests (6-7—13).
• Brayden Point scored two goals for his 14^th multi-point effort of the season. Point has found the scoresheet in four consecutive contests (4-3—7) and has 54 points this season (25-29—54).
• Steven Stamkos recorded his 12^th multi-point game of the season with one goal and one assist. Stamkos has pointed in three straight contests (2-3—5).
• Andrei Vasilevskiy collected his 16ht win of the season and improved to 7-1-0 over his last eight starts with 21 saves on 24 shots against.

Bolts Quotes

• Victor Hedman on the eight wins in nine games: “We did some tweaks a few weeks back and I think the confidence for our group has grown. Everyone is finding their roles. The guys coming up have done a phenomenal job. You can't say enough good things about those guys from just being in Syracuse. They come up and they’ve made a difference for us. I'm very happy with the way Crozier and Lilleberg have been playing, giving us really solid, great minutes, moving the puck, creating some offense too. It's huge. Obviously, we want to get back to closing out games and not giving up three goals like we did in the last two, but at the same time, we put ourselves right where we want to be going into the break and we just have to keep it rolling when we get back.”
• Cooper on the eight wins in nine games: “I think Vasy’s probably lead the way here. I think he's played outstanding for us. I think Crozier and Lilleberg have been fantastic on the back end for us. They’ve been chipping in. Chaffee comes in for a couple games and scores. Merelä comes in and he's been solid. All these new kids that have come in…They've been outstanding for us. It’s fun to have them here. I think our guys are pumped for them. I’ve got to give them a ton of credit for kind of pushing us and helping us be better while some pretty established, good hockey players are out of the lineup. It's always dicey when injuries hit and you’re missing some big players, but these guys have been great coming in.”

Krenner’s Three Stars

1. Victor Hedman
2. Brandon Hagel
3. Brayden Point

Lightning Look Ahead

• Wednesday, February 7 at New York Rangers, 7 p.m. ET, Madison Square Garden
• Thursday, February 8 at New York Islanders, 8 p.m. ET, UBS Arena
• Saturday, February 10 at Columbus Blue Jackets, 7 p.m. ET, Nationwide Arena