Ducks can’t stop Steven Stamkos and Nikita Kucherov in loss to Lightning
TAMPA, Fla. — Steven Stamkos scored a pair of power-play goals during a 3:51 span in the second period and had an assist, NHL points leader Nikita Kucherov had three assists, and the Tampa Bay Lightning beat the Ducks 5-1 on Saturday night.
Stamkos has 204 power-play goals, which ties Wayne Gretzky for 17th place. The center has 533 goals overall and moved into tie for 35th place with Frank Mahovlich. He had just two goals in his previous 12 games after a four-goal game at Edmonton last month.
“That’s kind of weird,” Stamkos said about tying Gretzky. “It goes to show he did a lot of damage not on the power play, too.”
Isac Lundestrom, Ryan Strome and Frank Vatrano score for the Ducks, but it’s not enough to keep up with the Carolina Hurricanes in a 6-3 loss.
Stamkos is the first Tampa Bay player to have 100 three-point games.
Kucherov became the 183rd player to reach 800 points and has 72 this season.
Victor Hedman, Calvin de Haan and Brandon Hagel also scored, and Andrei Vasilevskiy made 19 saves as Tampa Bay won its third straight.
Lukas Dostal stopped 36 shots and Frank Vatrano had a power-play goal for the Ducks, who have lost nine of 11 (2-8-1). Goalie John Gibson, who left Thursday’s game at Carolina after two periods because of an upper-body injury, was the backup.
Tampa Bay was three for three on the power play.
“In a game like this you can’t have penalties,” Ducks right wing Jakob Silfverberg said. “They scored on them. It’s tough to come back from that.”
The game got chippy after Ducks right wing Brett Leason was hurt on a hard check by Lightning defenseman Emil Martinsen Lilleberg six minutes into the second. Leason didn’t return because of an upper-body injury.
“That changed the game for us,” Lightning coach Jon Cooper said. “I honestly thought we were asleep in the first period. Quite frankly, it was very disappointing. I think the players knew my feelings after the first, I hope the kid’s OK. It was a pretty clean hit. He kind of brought us into the fight.”
Ducks coach Greg Cronin had no update postgame on Leason.
Six minutes later Hedman received two minor penalties and a 10-minute misconduct during a scrum.
Stamkos made it 2-0 at 10:56 into second. After Vatrano scored on the power play, Stamkos got the goal back when his pass went off Ducks defenseman Ilya Lyubushkin’s stick at 14:47.
De Haan’s and Hagel’s goals came in the third period. Hedman scored on a second-period power play.
Ducks rookie center Leo Carlsson, taken second overall in the 2023 draft, participated in morning skate but sat out his 10th consecutive game because of a sprained right knee.
Ducks left wing Alex Killorn, a two-time Stanley Cup winner with the Lightning, was honored with a video tribute and received a loud ovation in his first game back in Tampa.
“A moment in my career I’ll never forget,” Killorn said. “It was special.”
Up next for the Ducks: at Florida on Monday night.
