PITTSBURGH _ The Penguins returned from an eight-day break and picked up right where they left off.
They scored a heap of goals on home ice and kicked off 2017 with their fifth consecutive win, downing the Lightning, 6-2, on Sunday at PPG Paints Arena.
Home-ice dominance has been a central theme of this season, and that held Sunday. The Penguins improved to 18-2-2 at home and ran their home point streak to 12 (11-0-1).
While celebrating the 2009 Stanley Cup-winning team, the Penguins beat the Lightning for the second time this season to improve to 13-3-1 in their past 17 meetings against them.
Starting his second in a row as Matt Murray remains out with a lower-body injury, Marc-Andre Fleury stopped 28 of 30 shots to pick up his 13th win of the season.
Six different players scored goals for the Penguins (26-8-5), who are tied with the Rangers for second place in the Metropolitan Division with 57 points. The Penguins, though, have played four fewer games.
After he had his six-game point streak snapped on New Year's Eve in a 4-3 win over the Canadiens, Sidney Crosby bounced back with a pair of assists. Crosby, linemate Conor Sheary and Matt Cullen led the Penguins with two points apiece.
Jonathan Drouin gave Tampa Bay a 1-0 lead at 2:19 of the second period with a wrist shot from 17 feet that found its way into an empty net.
Sheary pulled the Penguins even at 6:44. Bryan Rust fired a turning shot from the slot, and Sheary nudged it the final few inches across the goal line.
Eric Fehr made it 2-1 at 11:14 of the second period off an assist from Cullen, who led a two-on-one rush and dished to Fehr through Victor Hedman. Fehr buried it from the inner-edge of the right circle and inside the left post for his fifth of the season.
The assist snapped a nine-game point-less drought for Cullen. Sheary's goal, meanwhile, extended his point streak to a career-high four games.
Chris Kunitz and Scott Wilson scored goals less than a minute apart early in the third period to create the final bit of separation. And also to underscore a strong performance from the Penguins' bottom two lines.
Olli Maatta made a smart pass into the slot, and Kunitz whipped one past Andrei Vasilevskiy at 2:33. Wilson chased down a loose puck and deked to his backhand to beat Vasilevskiy via breakaway at 3:28.
Vladislav Namestnikov hammered a bouncing puck past Fleury on the power play at 5:40 of the third period, but the Lightning could not get any closer. Phil Kessel chipped in a rebound at 7:50 of the third for his 13th of season. It also extended his scoring streak to five games, tied for his longest as a Penguin.
Kris Letang added a power play goal at 17:20 of the third to produce the final margin.
The Penguins are scheduled to practice Monday and Tuesday before kicking off a three-game road trip Wednesday in Washington.
