TAMPA, Fla. — Pat Maroon scored twice within the third interval, Steven Stamkos had a aim and an help and the Tampa Bay Lightning beat the slumping Washington Capitals 5-1 on Thursday night time.

Stamkos assisted on Alex Killorn’s aim halfway via the opening interval, then scored his thirty second of the season with 2.8 seconds left to place Tampa Bay up by two.

Maroon, who entered the sport with three objectives this season, scored early within the third interval to provide Tampa Bay a 3-1 lead, then put the sport away along with his second with 3:32 to go. Erik Cernak added a short-handed, empty-net aim with 1:54 remaining.

Andrei Vasilevskiy made 30 saves for the Lightning, who’ve received back-to-back video games after dropping 4 in a row.

“If we defend and play the right way, we win,” Maroon mentioned. “You’ve seen it the past few years. We’re playing smarter with the puck too. We know better and we know what it takes. We’re too good of a hockey team and we have too many veterans in here to struggle like we have.”

Craig Smith scored and Darcy Kuemper, enjoying for the second straight night time, made 29 saves for the Capitals. They are 1-4-2 of their previous seven video games and fell seven factors behind the Pittsburgh Penguins for the second wild-card playoff berth within the Eastern Conference.

“No one here is giving up,” Smith mentioned. “There’s no quit here.”

Tampa Bay opened the scoring 9:20 into the primary interval when Killorn tipped Mikhail Sergachev’s power-play wrist shot from the left level previous Kuemper. Stamkos put the Lightning up 2-0 by beating Kuemper with a one-timer after a faceoff win by Pierre-Edouard Bellemare.

The Capitals picked up their play within the second interval and bought on the board with 3:50 left when Smith picked up a missed shot off the tip boards and backhanded it off Vasilevskiy’s left skate and over the aim line.

“Our first period was tough. That wasn’t the way we wanted to start,” Capitals coach Peter Laviolette mentioned. “We had a much better second period and gave ourselves a chance going into the third, but the start was no good. We weren’t quick enough.”

Maroon tapped within the rebound of Anthony Cirelli’s shot 4:30 into the third interval to revive the Lightning’s two-goal lead, then banged residence one other rebound off Cirelli’s shot.

Lightning coach Jon Cooper was delighted to see his fourth line produce a few gritty objectives.

“Anytime you’re getting those goals two feet from the net, you’re doing something right and putting yourself in the right area,” he mentioned. “It’s good for Patty to get a couple there.”

With the playoffs approaching, Cirelli mentioned specializing in arduous work and protection is essential.

“Obviously, we want to be a hard team to play against. We want to limit chances and opportunities, especially 5-on-5 chances,” he mentioned. “We’ve been great over the past few games, and we have to keep building on that. We have to continue to eliminate chances and play great team defense. We have to bring it up to another level.”

Capitals ahead T.J. Oshie left the sport after the primary interval with an upper-body harm and didn't return.

NOTES: Washington’s Alex Ovechkin, whose 50 objectives in 78 profession video games towards the Lightning are essentially the most he’s scored towards any workforce, was restricted to 2 photographs on aim and was minus-3 however had a career-high 11 hits. … The Capitals fell to 2-7-1 within the second recreation of back-to-back units. … The victory was Vasilevskiy’s 221st because the begin of the 2017-18 season, by far essentially the most within the NHL; Connor Hellebuyck of the Winnipeg Jets is second with 194.

UP NEXT

Capitals: Host the New York Rangers on Sunday.

Lightning: Host the New York Islanders on Saturday night time.

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