Tampa Bay Shoots to 6-3 Win

Tampa Bay’s 33, second-period shots at Blackhawks’ goalie Cam Ward set an NHL record Sunday, and that juiced the Lightning to a 6-3 win in Chicago.

Tampa Bay forward Anthony Cirelli led the team with nine shots on goal, and his goal 4:22 into the second gave the Lightning a 2-1 lead. The super quick Lightning spent most of the second period in the Chicago end.

“I don’t think we touched the puck at all, and that was the part that was disturbing against a good hockey team,” Blackhawks coach Joel Quenneville told writer Mark King. “Pucks went through us, nobody got knocked down around our net, they had two or three A-plus opportunities on almost every shot. That’s the part you can’t let happen.”

Tampa Bay is a favorite to win the Stanley Cup this year. Saturday, the Lightning blew a lead and lost to Minnesota. A day later, it wasn’t going to happen again. “They’re a tough team,” said Ward. “They have a lot of offensive talent out there. … Their speed and their tenacity was hard to contain at times. It’s unfortunate, but we’ll regroup here and put this one away and get ready for the next one.”

Scoring Leaders

Alexandre Fortin, David Kampf and Nick Schmaltz scored for Chicago. Ward made 49 saves, the most by a Blackhawks goalie since Nikolai Khabibulin‘s 56 against the Detroit Red Wings on April 5, 2007.

For the Lightning, Brayden Point (cover photo) had a goal and two assists, and Nikita Kucherov and Victor Hedman each had a goal and an assist for the Lightning, whose 55 shots on goal were the most in their history.

Puck Patter

• Chicago forward Alex DeBrincat’s seven-game scoring streak ended Sunday. DeBrincat had one shot on goal.
• Tampa Bay goalie Louis Domingue made 33 saves.
• The NHL officially began tracking shots-on-goal during the 1997-98 season, and no team threw more rubber at the net in one period than Tampa Bay did Sunday.
• The Dallas Stars and Montreal Canadiens held the previous single-period record for shots on net with 30.
• The Blackhawks: (4-2-2) host Anaheim (5-3-1) Tuesday. Puck drops at 7:30 p.m. CDST. 8:30 p.m.
• Tampa Bay (5-1-1) is at Colorado Wednesday to take on the Avalanche (5-1-2). Puck drops at 8:30 p.m. CDST.

Cover Photo Credit: Matt Marton/AP

Roger Dier covers the Blackhawks for Full Press Coverage. Follow Roger on Twitter @rogerdier.

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