After spending most of the week on the West Coast, the Tampa Bay Lightning were back in the sunshine state on Saturday as they welcomed the team from the nation’s capital, the Washington Capitals. The Lightning split their first two games of the week with a 3-2 loss to the Colorado Avalanche and a win over the Las Vegas Golden Knights. They were looking to get another win streak going on Saturday with Washington in town and led by Jake Guentzel and Brandon Hagel, they did just that, skating their way to a 3-2 win over the Capitals.
Tampa Bay had to play from behind early into Saturday’s game against Washington. Brandon Duhaime struck first to put Washington on top 1-0 just over four minutes into the period on a snap shot assisted by Ethen Frank and Nic Dowd.
But two minutes later the Lightning struck back on a snap shot by Emil Lilleberg for his first goal of the season to tie the game up 1-1. He was assisted by Guentzel and Charle-Edouard D’Astous.
Tied 1-1, Guentzel put the Lightning on top with five minutes left in the first period. He tipped a shot in on an assist Victor Hedman and Hagel to make it a 2-1 Lightning lead. The score remained there as time expired in the first to keep the Lightning’s lead in tact going into the second period.
As the second period got under way, however, John Carlson was credited with an unassisted goal on an own-goal to make it a 2-2 game, where the score remained through the remainder of the period.
Tampa Bay re-took the lead in the third period. Earning his second point of the day, Hagel took a snap shot that went through the goal posts to give the Lightning a 3-2 lead. Hagel’s goal was assisted by Dominic James who has begun to play extremely well this week, along with D’Astous.
That would end up being the game-winning goal as the Lightning went on to defeat the Capitals 3-2 to improve to an overall 8-5-2 on the season.
Guentzel and Hagel each had two points on Saturday as the Lightning closed out the week 2-1 and on a high note.
The Lightning will return to the ice on Wednesday at 7:00PM EST to take on the New York Rangers (7-6-2).