MONTREAL _ Steven Stamkos is not off a to a very Stamkos-like start to the season. But he had a classic Stamkos showing with two goals on Saturday, as the Lightning beat the Canadiens, 4-1.
It wasn't that the Lightning captain hadn't been playing well, but he hadn't been scoring goals. Stamkos came into the game with just two goals on the season. His six assists kept Stamkos among the team's top scorers, just without the goals he was accustomed to.
Stamkos didn't just score on Saturday, he scored in his typical fashion.
The first goal came as the power play expired, the third attempt on the play. Twice, the Lightning tried to bang the puck past Carey Price in the crease, and finally it bounced out to the hashmarks and Nikita Kucherov slid it over to Stamkos at the opposite dot. Stamkos did as Stamkos does, and one-timed it home. To quote the Lightning's tweet, it was a Stamkos One-Timer(TM).
It was the kind of performance that has to feel good on Hockey Night in Canada, in front of loud, passionate Bell Centre.
Stamkos didn't have a goal until the fourth game of the season. He played it off when he finally got that one against Detroit, but he's not used to going that long without a goal. There were another five goals before his second one. Now, he's getting back to the usual with only a few days between scoring.
Not that Stamkos was the only Lightning player to stand out. This was another matchup of two of the top goalies in the league. Pekka Rinne and Nashville beat Andrei Vasilevskiy and the Lightning on Thursday. But this time it was the 24-year-old Russian who bested Price and the Canadiens.
Vasilevskiy got flat out beat on the first goal. Max Domi sniped a shot that Vasilevskiy didn't even have a chance to react to before it was behind him less than a minute into the game. But that was the only one to get by him.
After that, Vasilevskiy sprawled, dove and stood tall for the Lightning. On the other end, the Lightning lit up Price for four goals.
J.T. Miller capitalized on a nice takeaway by Anton Stralman. The defenseman batted a pass out of midair as the Canadiens tried to get out of the defensive zone. Miller picked up the loose puck, walked in on Price and roofed one.
Yanni Gourde celebrated his new six-year contract with a goal in the third period, banging home a rebound at the post.
