Lightning rally with 3-goal third period to beat Oilers
EDMONTON, Alberta (AP) -- The Tampa Bay Lightning benefited from a lot of puck luck on Friday night.
Victor Hedman had a goal and two assists, and Steven Stamkos capped Tampa Bay's three-goal, third-period rally to lift the Lightning to a 3-2 victory over the Edmonton Oilers.
Nikita Kucherov also scored for the Lightning as each of their goals deflected in off an Edmonton skater.
"You earn your breaks and we had goals off caroms, but that's the way it goes when you're believing in yourselves," Stamkos said. "We didn't quit and we got rewarded."
Ben Bishop had 24 saves for the Lightning.
"We'll take it any way we can right now," Bishop said. "We haven't been getting goals the regular way, so we'll take them any way. We had a really good third period, we talked about it, the guys really wanted it and I think they deserved it."
Justin Schultz and Benoit Pouliot scored for the Oilers, who led 2-0 after two periods. Cam Talbot stopped 23 shots.
"We had three pucks go off us into our net with a 2-0 lead, so that part is disappointing, maybe a little bit of puck luck that didn't go our way," Oilers coach Todd McLellan said. "We didn't score enough to outplay our blunders around the net, and as a result we ended up losing."
The Lightning pulled to 2-1 three minutes into the third period as Kucherov's shot deflected off defender Brandon Davidson and past Talbot.
Edmonton allowed another own-goal with five minutes left as Taylor Hall inadvertently deflected Hedman `s shot past Talbot to tie the score.
A minute later, Stamkos' shot hit the skate of Darnell Nurse's skate and into the net to give the Lightning the lead.
Talbot said he had never before seen anything like what happened to his team.
"It's extremely frustrating," he said. "Especially where we are in the standings. We need every point that we can get. When points slip away like that when you are doing the right things for most of the game, that is tough to swallow."
Edmonton opened the scoring with 4:40 remaining in the first period as Schultz brought the puck in from the blue line and was able to poke his own rebound past Bishop.
Hedman kept it a 1-0 game heading into the second, robbing Leon Draisaitl with a sprawling save while Bishop was out of the net on the play with 8 seconds to play in the first.
The Oilers took a two-goal lead on the power play four minutes into the second period when Ryan Nugent-Hopkins put a shot on net that was tipped in by Pouliot.
NOTES: The teams split last year's series, each winning 3-2 on home ice. They will play each other again in a rematch on Jan. 19 in Tampa, Florida. ... The last time the Lightning won in Edmonton was on March 7, 2007. ... Oilers F Iiro Pakarinen returned to the lineup after missing the last three games with a concussion. ... Remaining out for the Oilers were Connor McDavid (collarbone), Nail Yakupov (ankle), Oscar Klefbom (finger) and Andrew Ference (undisclosed). ... The Lightning were without Joel Vermin (hand).
