Stamkos has 2 goals, assist, Lightning defeat Devils in shootout

NEWARK, N.J. -- Steven Stamkos had two goals and an assist for the Tampa Bay Lightning in a 4-3 shootout win against the New Jersey Devils at Prudential Center on Thursday.

Mikhail Sergachev had two assists and Andrei Vasilevskiy made 32 saves for the Lightning (41-22-6), who won two straight against the Devils to pull within one point of the Toronto Maple Leafs for second in the Atlantic Division. The Maple Leafs have two games in hand.
"The Devils are going to be a 50-win team in this league, and for us to come into their building and take two, we needed a lot of things to go our way," Tampa Bay coach Jon Cooper said. "Our penalty killing, goaltending, timely goals, but that's what happens when you win games.
"We now have to build off what we've done here and continue this when we get back home."

Stamkos, Tampa Bay's captain, had four shots on goal and played 18:12 after missing a 4-1 win at New Jersey on Tuesday due to a knee injury.
"You want to be feeling as good as you can coming down the stretch, so I think it was probably the smart decision not to play the other night," Stamkos said. "I felt 10 times better tonight than I did against [the] Winnipeg [Jets in a 3-2 loss on Sunday), so well worth it."
Timo Meier scored two goals, Nico Hischier had two assists, and Akira Schmid made 21 saves for the Devils (44-17-7), who lost consecutive games for the first time since Dec. 23-28.
New Jersey is one point behind the Carolina Hurricanes, who have two games in hand, for first in the Metropolitan Division.
"They're a good team; we saw that [Tuesday]," Meier said. "They took advantage of our mistakes. It was a tough game, but we stuck with it, we capitalized on some of our chances."

Meier, acquired from the San Jose Sharks on Feb. 26, pulled the Devils into a 3-3 tie at 17:44 of the third period with a power-play goal on a one-timer from the right circle and Schmid pulled for a 6-on-4 advantage.
"Timo's just trying to fit in and sometimes it takes 10 or 15 games to figure out what fits," New Jersey coach Lindy Ruff said. "We know he's a great shooter, so you got to get the puck on his stick. We got to get him in position to shoot."
Alex Killorn scored the decisive goal on a snap shot from the slot in the third round of the tiebreaker.
"I saw [Ross Colton] go low blocker [on his goal in the first round of the shootout], so I figured I'd try the same," Killorn said.
Colton scored from the slot to give the Lightning a 1-0 lead at 1:09 of the first period. Sergachev took the initial shot from the top of the left face-off circle that deflected off the right knee of Colton.
Tomas Tatar tied it 1-1 after taking a pass from Hischier and scoring on a snap shot from the left hash marks at 8:59 of the second period.
Stamkos scored on snap shot from low in the left face-off circle for a 2-1 lead at 18:11, 20 seconds after the Lightning killed a 5-on-3 power play by the Devils for two minutes.
"When you don't score on a 5-on-3 you usually don't win the game, and very rarely do you see a full two minutes, so hats off to our penalty killers out there blocking shots, sacrificing bodies," Stamkos said. "[Vasilevskiy] had some big saves and then we score coming out of the box, so we deserved that one. The guys fought hard on that 5-on-3 and got the job done."

Meier tied it 2-2 on a shot from the bottom of the right circle at 9:41 of the third period.
Stamkos then scored his second of the game on a one-timer from the left circle on the power play to give the Lightning a 3-2 lead at 15:13.
"These two games against the Devils were a byproduct of us playing the way we want to coming down the stretch and into the playoffs," Stamkos said. "Obviously, 'Vasi' made some big saves for us in the third when they pushed. We found a way against a really good team."
NOTES: It was the second of three games between the teams in a span of six days. The Lightning will host the regular-season finale against the Devils on Sunday. ... New Jersey forward Dawson Mercer had an assist for his 50th point of the season. … Devils forward Yegor Sharangovich had one shot in 11:39 in his first game since March 3. … Tampa Bay forward Nikita Kucherov reached 70 assists for the second time in the NHL (2018-19). He is the third active player with multiple such seasons (Connor McDavid, five times; Sidney Crosby, twice).