FLA Hockey Round-Up: Bolts Ground Jets, Devils Paste Panthers

TAMPA, Fla. (AP) — Andrei Vasilevskiy made 24 saves in his 300th NHL win, and the Tampa Bay Lightning stopped Winnipeg’s seven-game win streak with a 4-1 victory over the Jets on Thursday night.

Vasilevskiy is the 40th goaltender in league history to win 300 games. He reached the milestone in 490 games, the fewest in NHL history, 31 faster than Jacques Plante.

Winnipeg lost for just the second time in 17 games this season. It dropped to 7-1 on the road.

Jake Guentzel scored twice for the Lightning, who had lost their previous five games against the Jets, including 7-4 in Winnipeg on Nov. 3.

Guentzel put Tampa Bay in front 7:24 into the first period, and goals by Brandon Hagel and Anthony Cirelli 57 seconds apart early in the second made it 3-0.

Winnipeg captain Adam Lowry scored on a deflection at 6:54 of the second, but Guentzel got an empty-netter with 21 seconds left.

Jets backup goalie Eric Comrie made 25 saves but lost for the first time in his four starts this season.

Takeaways

Jets: Winnipeg’s power play entered the game leading the NHL at 42.2%, but it went 0 for 5.

Lightning: Tampa Bay, coming off a seven-day layoff, won for the first time this month after going 0-3-1 in its first four November games.

Key moment

Cirelli’s power-play goal 4:07 into the second was also the first by the Lightning in 17 extra-man opportunities at Amalie Arena this season. Tampa Bay scored on 31.2% of its power-play chances (38 of 122) at home in 2023-24.

Key stat

Vasilevskiy’s win was just his fifth in 13 career decisions against the Jets (5-7-1).

Up next

The Jets visit Florida on Saturday night. The Lightning host New Jersey on Saturday.

SUNRISE, Fla. (AP) — Jesper Bratt got his second career hat trick, Stefan Noesen scored twice and the New Jersey Devils beat the Florida Panthers 6-2 on Thursday night to sweep a two-game series with the Stanley Cup champions.

Jack Hughes had a goal and two assists for the Devils, who also won 4-1 in Florida on Tuesday. Jake Allen stopped 25 shots for New Jersey, which got three power-play scores — along with a short-handed empty-netter with 5:12 left, Bratt’s third of the night — and is now 7-2-0 in its last nine games.

Sam Reinhart — the first player with 13 goals this season — and Jesper Boqvist scored for Florida, which hadn’t dropped two straight since Oct. 10 and 12. Sergei Bobrovsky made 23 saves.

Takeaways

Devils: New Jersey became the first team this season to get two goals in the final 12 seconds of periods. Both were power-play tallies; Bratt scored with two seconds left in the first, Noesen with 11 seconds left in the second.

Panthers: Florida got Sam Bennett back Thursday after he missed Tuesday’s game with a minor upper-body issue. Bennett had an assist on Boqvist’s goal.

Key moment

The Panthers, down 4-2, opened the third period on a power play but it was wiped out 22 seconds later when Carter Verhaeghe was called for tripping — one of many calls that Florida wasn’t thrilled about during the evening.

Key stat

The Devils already have two games with three power-play goals this season. They had five in the last six regular seasons combined.

Up next

The Devils visit Tampa Bay on Saturday and will try to go 3-0-0 in Florida this season; they haven’t had a perfect record in the Sunshine State (excluding COVID-affected seasons) since going 4-0-0 at Florida and Tampa Bay in 2000-01.

The Panthers host NHL-leading Winnipeg on Saturday.

(Associated Press)