Three Things: Lightning Strikes Twice For Marchenko, Changes On The Fly, Stamkos' Hat Trick & Four-Point Night

By Will Chase on April 10, 2024 at 8:15 am
Columbus Blue Jackets' Kirill Marchenko scores a goal as Tampa Bay Lightning's Erik Cernak and Luke Glendening attempted to defend during the second period at Amalie Arena.
Kim Klement Neitzel-USA TODAY Sports
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A good look at the other side and who you want to be.

Steven Stamkos led the way with four points (three goals, one assist) as the Tampa Bay Lightning beat the Columbus Blue Jackets 5-2 on Tuesday night at Amalie Arena.

Stamkos is on a six-game point streak (10 goals, two assists).

Brayden Point took over the goal-scoring lead for the Lightning with his 44th goal. Anthony Cirelli scored.

Nikita Kucherov extended his seven-game point streak (two goals, 14 assists) with three assists. He leads the Lightning with 96 assists and set a new career high with his 39th multi-point game. Kucherov has more three-point games (23) on the season than games without a point. Brandon Hagel had two assists. Anthony Duclair picked up career point No. 300 with an assist. Victor Hedman and Erik Cernak each had an assist.

Andrei Vasilevskiy made 30 saves.

Kirill Marchenko scored twice for Columbus.

Cole Sillinger, Damon Severson, Johnny Gaudreau, and Zach Werenski picked up the assists.

Jet Greaves made 28 saves.

Lightning Strikes Twice For Marchenko

Marchenko's 22nd goal at 19:17 tied the game at 1-1, giving him a new career high in the goal-scoring department.

Sillinger and Severson had the assists.

At 7:13 of the second period, Marchenko gave Columbus the 2-1 lead on his 23rd of the season.

Gaudreau picked up his 500th career assist on the play, and Werenski tied James Wisniewski for most assists in a season by a Blue Jackets defenseman with his 44th.

Marchenko now leads the Blue Jackets in goals.

Changes On The Fly

The Blue Jackets lost Alex Nylander during the pre-game warmups as a lower-body injury kept him out of game action.

Columbus' top line was a combination of Johnny Gaudreau - Dmitri Voronkov - Justin Danforth.

Carson Meyer took Nylander's spot but only played two shifts after leaving the game due to an upper-body injury.

It was a competitive game until the third period when Tampa erupted for three goals as the shorthanded Blue Jackets battled a Lightning team revving up just in time for the playoffs.

The Lightning are 7-2-1 in their last 10 games and fourth in the Atlantic Division with a playoff spot already clinched. They lead the first wild card spot in the Eastern Conference.

Stamkos' Hat Trick & Four-Point Night

Stamkos is set to be an unrestricted free agent at the end of the season, and boy does he still have it.

The 34-year-old future Hall of Famer led both teams with four points (three goals, one assist) to help Tampa win. The hat trick is the 13th of his career.

Stamkos has three straight multi-goal games over his six-game point streak. His power-play goal at 14:17 of the second period tied the game 2-2 and gave him 214 for his career with the man-advantage, which ranks first all-time in Lightning history.

Vincent Lecavalier is second with 112 power-play goals, and no other player in Lightning history has 100 power-play goals.

Stamkos' second goal of the night made it 4-2 at 5:56, and it came 16 seconds after Cirelli's goal. Stamkos also picked up the assist on Cirelli's tally.

Into The Den

The Blue Jackets travel to play the Florida Panthers on Thursday, Apr. 11 at 7:00 p.m. ET. Florida leads the season series 2-0-0 after winning 5-4 in overtime on Nov. 6 from Miami and winning 5-2 at Nationwide Arena on Dec. 10.

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