NHL Game Summary - Tampa Bay at Vancouver
Vancouver, BC (SportsNetwork.com) - Steven Stamkos finished with two goals and an assist and the Tampa Bay Lightning handed the Vancouver Canucks their first loss of the regular season by a 4-2 score on Saturday.
Ryan Callahan scored the go-ahead goal in the second period, Alex Killorn also lit the lamp and Ondrej Palat added two helpers for Tampa Bay, which saw Ben Bishop make 30 saves.
"This was huge," Stamkos said. "In the third period, we kind of just shut it down and that's learning from the mistakes we've made in other games."
Chris Higgins and Alexander Edler both scored for the Canucks, who were coming off a 2-0 shutout of Edmonton on Friday.
Eddie Lack started his first game of the season, but allowed all four goals on 24 shots.
The Lightning went ahead for good on the power play with 3:12 remaining in the middle stanza.
Jason Garrison, a former Canuck, dished the puck over to Stamkos, who re- entered the play after retrieving a new stick from the bench. Stamkos skated to the right circle and sent a cross-ice pass to Callahan, whose wrister over the shoulder of Lack found twine.
Tampa Bay added an insurance marker 6:04 into the third. Killorn entered the Canucks' zone up the left side and backhanded a pass to Tyler Johnson. Lack turned aside Johnson's shot, but Killorn jumped on the rebound and fired it home for a 4-2 game.
Earlier, Stamkos needed just 53 seconds to find the back of the net. He raced into the Canucks' zone on a breakaway after tracking down Palat's pass through the neutral zone and backhanded the puck over the pad of Lack for the early lead.
"I cost them the first goal," Vancouver's Henrik Sedin said.
Higgins sent a pass to Nick Bonino in the slot. Bonino quickly returned the puck to Higgins, who put home his own rebound to make it a 1-1 game 7:15 into the first.
Just over a minute later, Tampa Bay regained the lead on Stamkos' second goal of the night. Callahan sent a pass from behind the net to Stamkos, who beat Lack with a backhander in the slot.
Daniel Sedin entered the Tampa Bay zone up the right side and dished a cross- ice pass to Edler, who tied the game with a wrist shot on the power play 2:42 into the second.