Stamkos gets 498th goal, Lightning beat Coyotes 5-3

Seattle Sports

TAMPA, Fla. (AP) — Steven Stamkos scored his 498th goal and the Tampa Bay Lightning rallied to beat the Arizona Coyotes 5-3 on Saturday.

Stamkos stopped a six-game goal drought, putting the Lightning ahead 3-2 from the left circle during a power play at 11:12 of the second period. The star center tied Glenn Anderson for 47th place on the career list.

The Lightning captain has 189 power-play goals, one away from tying Pierre Turgeon for 22nd all-time. Stamkos also had a third-period assist and tied Pat LaFontaine for 89th on the career points list with 1,013.

Brayden Point, Mikhail Sergachev, Alex Killorn and Brandon Hagel also scored as the Lightning won their seventh straight home game.

Point set a team record with a goal in eight consecutive home games. Victor Hedman had three assists, and Nikita Kucherov added two helpers to reach 40 assists in 35 games, the fastest in franchise history.

Andrei Vasilevskiy, starting for the third time in four days, made 29 saves.

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Arizona, which has lost nine straight road games (0-7-2), got goals from Travis Boyd, Christian Fischer and Nick Bjugstad. Karel Vejmelka stopped 30 shots.

Stamkos’ goal came 28 seconds after Sergachev scored. Arizona challenged the play for offside, but the call stood. The Coyotes received a minor penalty for the failed challenge, leading to Stamkos’ 17th goal this season.

Bjugstad scored 92 seconds after Stamkos’ goal, but Tampa Bay went up 4-3 on Killorn’s breakaway goal with 1:01 left in the second.

Hagel had a power-play goal in the third.

Boyd and Fischer put Arizona up 2-0 with goals 34 seconds apart in the first.

Boyd got the opening goal when the rebound of his shot went off Tampa Bay defenseman Zach Bogosian 6:12 into the game.

Point cut the deficit to 2-1 at 10:53 of the first by knocking home a thigh-high puck. Point has 15 goals in his last 16 games.

ONE-SIDED AFFAIR

The Lightning look to continue their dominance over the Blackhawks on Tuesday night in Chicago. Since the Blackhawks beat Tampa Bay 4-2 in the 2015 Stanley Cup Final, the Lightning have won 17 of 20 regular-season meetings between the teams. Vasilevskiy is 13-0-0 in regular-season games against Chicago. The Blackhawks split two games when facing Vasilevskiy in the 2015 Final.

TRAINER’S ROOM

Coyotes center Nick Schmaltz sat out with an upper-body injury.

UP NEXT

Coyotes: Play at Florida on Tuesday night.

Lightning: The game in Chicago starts a three-game trip.

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