Point reverses course to lead comeback
TAMPA — After one period Thursday night, the Lightning trailed the Rangers by two goals and Brayden Point was a minus-2.
It was a rough start for the Lightning’s top-line center, but the regular season winding down, there was no time to dwell on it, and Point spent the next 40 minutes playing as if he was in video-game mode on the easy setting.
Point tied a franchise record with six points — including his fourth career hat trick and third this season — propelling the Lightning to a much-needed 6-3 comeback victory against the Metropolitan Division-leading Rangers at Amalie Arena.
“These points are huge for us,” Point said. ”We’re battling for a playoff spot here. You definitely take it personally. You never want to let the team down. So I think our mindset was just trying to get it back one at a time, not trying to force anything, but we’re just trying to play our way.”
With the win, the Lightning (35-25-6, 76 points) are now four points ahead of the Islanders and Red Wings in the first wild-card playoff position in the Eastern Conference with 16 games remaining.
“We have a group that wants to make the playoffs and they believe they can,” Lightning coach Jon Cooper said. “By no means is one win putting us in the playoffs. We still have a long way to go, but early in the year I think with this group, and with so many new faces, we have probably found a way to lose that game.
“And now, with under 20 [games] left, this team is finding a way to win those games. And [the Rangers are] going to be heard from in the playoffs. That’s an exceptional team.”
Down early
The Lightning have seen several games get out of hand after falling behind early, and this one had the makings of a game that might snowball on them.
The Rangers had a two-onone breakaway and Point was on the backcheck and played Vincent Trocheck, the puck carrier, leaving 36-goal scorer Artemi Panarin open for a cross-crease pass and an open net to give New York a 1-0 lead.
Point also found himself out of place on the Rangers’ second goal, along the opposite post when Mika Zibanejad sent a centering pass from behind the net to an uncovered Braden Schneider in front of the net.
Rangers fans filled Amalie Arena and took over the building with numerous chants.
“They’re so dynamic off the rush and breaking out,” Point said. “In the first and early second, we were making it too easy for them to do that. … So just trying to stay on top of them and limit their time and space was a big one for us.”
Second-period comeback
The Lightning dodged a bullet by killing off Victor Hedman’s slashing penalty midway through the second period, and Point then made a heady defensive play at the Rangers’ blue line, intercepting a pass with his stick, creating a two-on-one with Nikita Kucherov that ended with Point’s first goal.
Cooper shuffled his lines in the second period, and Anthony Duclair, playing his second game since being acquired at the trade deadline, found himself skating with Point and Kucherov. It was no coincidence that the Lightning scored on Duclair’s first two shifts on the top line.
Point put an initial shot on net that Duclair chased into the corner, then found Point open in the slot. Duclair then circled around the back of the net and found a rebound through traffic along the back post and scored his second goal in as many games to tie the score, 2-2.
“Any time you get in that top six, no matter who you’re playing with, it’s gonna be a show,” Duclair said. ”I just want to get out of the way and use my speed and create some open space for them and let them do their thing.”
Taking control
The Rangers fans came back to life when Jack Roslovic’s goal 1:48 into the third gave New York the lead again, but Point answered, taking advantage of open space in fouron-four. He drifted into the offensive zone along the left wing, took a pass from Victor Hedmanm used some excellent stick work to get past Erik Gustafsson, and tipped it up past Igor Shesterkin.
Point’s best play might have been assisting on the Lightning’s go-ahead goal on the power play, when he took a pass from Kucherov, spun around Zibanejad with his back to the net, then found Stamkos for a wide-open one-timer from the left circle to give Tampa Bay a 4-3 lead that quieted the New York fans.
Point’s third goal came with 5:12 remaining in regulation and sent hats onto the ice, and Kucherov’s empty-netter with 3:38 left capped a five-point night for him and sent the Rangers fans to the exits en masse.
“You do feel it both ways,” Stamkos said of the crowd, which resembled a playoff atmosphere.
“There was a lot of Rangers fans, and you’re down 2-0 early and they get the chants going. So you want to quiet that a little bit. And I thought we did a good job of that. And obviously, it was nice to hear our fans at the end of the game.”
Only two other times has a Lightning player scored six points in a game. Defenseman Doug Crossman did it during the Lightning’s inaugural 1992-93 season, and Kucherov accomplished it this season on Nov. 24 at Carolina.