A pair of goals by Ondrej Palat was the difference for the Tampa Bay Lightning as they shock the hometown sellout crowd at TD Garden in Boston with a 4-1 win over the Boston Bruins to take a 2-1 series lead in the Eastern Conference Semifinal. The win marks just the tenth win in franchise history over the Bruins in Boston, including postseason play.
It took less than four minutes into the game for the Bolts to take advantage of a pair of mistakes by the Bruins in their own zone. Boston’s Matt Grzelcyk turned over the puck off a dump in saucer only to be taken by Tyler Johnson finding an open Palat for the first goal of the game just under two minutes into the game. Palat would strike again on a redirect in front of Tukka Rask off the shot by Victor Hedman for the second tally of the game for Tampa Bay.
Patrice Bergeron struck for Boston on the Bruins first power play opportunity of the game due to a Anton Stralman tripping penalty. The goal made it a one goal game, but it would never be closer for the remainder of the contest.
Anthony Cirelli celebrated a first for his young career as he extended Tampa Bay’s lead in the first period with great effort punching in his first career playoff goal making it 3-1 Lightning heading into the first intermission. Steven Stamkos’ first point of the series happened on the power play with an empty net goal wrapping up things at 4-1.
Tampa Bay outshot Boston 37-29 as Andrei Vasilevskiy finished with 28 saves. Tyler Johnson, Yanni Gourde, Ryan McDonough and Dan Girardi all finished with an assist.
Tampa Bay will look to take a commanding 3-1 series lead with a win over Boston on Friday night. Opening face off is set for just after 7:00pm est and you can hear the game on 970AM WFLA in Tampa Bay.
Photo Courtesy Of Getty Images