The Tampa Bay Lightning made all of it the way in which to the Stanley Cup Remaining with Steven Stamkos on the sidelines. They’re a robust sufficient workforce that they don’t essentially want him to beat the Dallas Stars – nevertheless it positive would make their job so much simpler if that they had the elite ahead within the lineup.

Tampa Bay was reminded of that final evening after they received only a glimmer of Stamkos. He was within the lineup on Wednesday for the primary time since Feb. 25 and he rapidly made his presence felt when he scored at 6:58 of the primary interval to present the Lightning at 2-Zero lead. He ended up logging simply 2:47 minutes within the first interval although and he didn’t come out for the beginning of the second. Finally he did return to the bench, however he by no means took one other shift and after the sport he wasn’t positive if he can be obtainable for Sport 4.

The Tampa Bay Lightning aren’t the one workforce who may not be at full power although. Placing apart that the Stars have been with out Ben Bishop, Radek Faksa, and Stephen Johns all through this collection, Dallas noticed forwards Alexander Radulov and Denis Gurianov get damage within the third interval of Sport 3. It stays to be seen if both of them might be obtainable going ahead, however lacking one or each of them can be an enormous blow to the Stars’ offense. The duo is tied for fourth place in Dallas’ playoff scoring race.

Accidents apart, this was a decisive win for the Lightning. The Stars truly managed to out shot the Lightning 16-Eight within the first interval, however Tampa Bay nonetheless led 2-1 going into the intermission. The second body was utterly one sided with the Lightning taking a staggering 21-Four edge in photographs and completed the interval with a 5-1 lead. Dallas’ Miro Heiskanen scored within the third interval, nevertheless it was too little, too late.

That places the stress on Dallas to reply again on Friday or be pushed to the brink of elimination. For what it’s price, this isn’t uncharted territory for the Stars this yr. They have been down 2-1 of their first spherical collection towards Calgary earlier than rallying again to a 4-2 collection victory. Dallas actually is a harmful sufficient workforce to do it towards Tampa Bay too.

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TAMPA BAY 5 DALLAS 2 (Lightning lead collection 2-1)

Victor Hedman scored the game-winning objective and registered two assists. He’s as much as 10 targets and 20 factors in 22 playoff contests.

Nikita Kucherov had a objective and an help for Tampa Bay. That offers him seven targets and 30 factors in 22 postseason video games. Because the begin of the wage cap period, Kucherov is simply the sixth participant to succeed in the 30-point milestone in a single playoff run. The purpose chief for a single playoff run within the wage cap period is Evgeni Malkin, who had 36 factors again in 2008-09.

Jason Dickinson scored a shorthanded objective for the Stars. It was his second objective and fourth level in 24 playoff video games.

Anton Khudobin stopped 24 of 29 photographs earlier than being yanked by Dallas. Jake Oettinger made simply his second NHL look, stopping the three photographs he confronted in 19:31 minutes of ice time.

On the different finish of the ice, Andrei Vasilevskiy saved 22 of 24 photographs. He’s allowed simply seven targets in three video games within the Stanley Cup Remaining.