Written by Fred Goodall at ABCNews.com
When one go-ahead goal was disallowed, the Tampa Bay Lightning kept charging and got another.
Nikita Kucherov scored twice and Alex Killorn snapped a third-period tie with his 11th career playoff goal Wednesday night, giving the defending Eastern Conference champions a 3-2 victory over the Detroit Red Wings in Game 1 of their first-round series.
Ben Bishop had 34 saves for the Lightning, who got the winner from Killorn less than two minutes after a potential go-ahead goal was waived off when Detroit coach Jeff Blashill successfully challenged that Tampa Bay was offsides before Victor Hedman scored.
“”We were ready for it,” Lightning forward Tyler Johnson said about the overtuned goal. “On the bench, it was ‘Keep going!’ And we did.”
“Not one ounce,” of panic, Lightning coach Jon Cooper added. ” Guys weren’t rattled. … Our response after that was outstanding.”
Johnson, playing after hitting his head on the boards and sitting out part of Tampa Bay’s regular season finale at Montreal, picked up a loose puck along the boards and fed Killorn, who deflected the puck past goalie Jimmy Howard at 8:52 of the third.
Kucherov scored in the first and second periods and also assisted on the winner.
“We did a great job coming back,” Killorn said. “The goal by Kuch really helped us going into the third.”
Mike Green and Justin Abdelkader scored for Detroit, which outshot the Lightning 36-34 but had few real scoring opportunities in the physical game after taking a 2-1 lead in the second period.
Bishop, who led the NHL in goals-against average and was second in save percentage, stopped five shots in the final 1:07 to seal the victory.
Game 2 of the best-of-7 series is Friday night at Amalie Arena.
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