Eurolanche

Lightning blank Avalanche

Steven Stamkos scored two goals, and Ben Bishop had 21 saves to help the Tampa Bay Lightning defeat the Colorado Avalanche 4-0 at Pepsi Center on Tuesday for their third consecutive win.

Stamkos' linemates had multipoint games; Ondrej Palat had a goal and two assists, and Vladislav Namestnikov had two assists. Victor Hedman also had two assists.

"We played solid," Stamkos said. "We had the puck for a lot of the night too, and that helps. That's a characteristic of our team, that when we're going well and have the puck, we get it in deep and let our skill and speed take over, and I thought we did that."

The Lightning (22-17-4) went 3-1-0 on their four-game road trip and are 11-6-1 since Dec. 2.

"We played well all the way around," Tampa Bay coach Jon Cooper said. "We competed really hard, we battled for pucks, we shot pucks even though it didn't look like it. When we're battling, our structure falls into place. When you're executing and you're going tape-to-tape, you can do some pretty good things. As this road trip has gone on, we've gotten better and better. It's funny how this trip goes. You lose the first one, you're down 2-0 after two (periods) in one game and you come out with three straight wins."

Bishop had a relatively easy time in his second shutout of the season and 14th of his NHL career. The Lightning outshot the Avalanche 23-12 in the second and third period, and 38-21 for the game.

"From the puck drop I thought it was our best structured game, start to finish, all year," Bishop said. "A little bit there in the second (period), we got away from it. We got a little comfortable with a 3-0 lead, but after intermission we got back to what we were doing. We got more chances being more structured."

The loss was the second in a row for the Avalanche (21-20-3), who are 9-10-3 at home. They've been shut out four times this season, including three times at home.

"Getting shut out at home, it's just tough," Colorado center Nathan MacKinnon said. "We didn't generate anything tonight. It was a pretty bad game for us. They were in the (Stanley) Cup Final for a reason last year. They're a good team, but this was one of our worst games of the season."

Stamkos, who had four goals on the road trip, scored twice in a 3:37 span early in the second period to give the Lightning a 3-0 lead. He has nine goals in the past 11 games.

"He's our leader and he's starting to heat up, and we may get four a night (from him)," Cooper said.

Tyler Johnson put in the rebound of Hedman's shot at 11:55 of the third period for a 4-0 advantage. The goal was Johnson's fifth of the season and his first in seven games after missing seven games because of an upper-body injury.

Stamkos scored his first goal at 1:39 of the second to complete a tic-tac-toe passing play with Palat and Namestnikov. He was at the bottom of the left circle when he one-timed Namestnikov's pass inside the near post.

"That was a beautiful play by them, but we didn't defend well," Avalanche coach Patrick Roy said. "The reason why we won some games is because we played well defensively, and we got away from that. They have a very well-balanced lineup and they were better than us."

Stamkos was in the slot and beat goalie Semyon Varlamov from point-blank range at 5:16 off Palat's pass from the left corner for his fifth two-goal game of the season and 20th goal overall.

Palat gave the Lightning a 1-0 lead at 10:29 of the first period, six seconds after the Avalanche finished killing Alex Tanguay's hooking penalty. After Hedman took a shot from the high slot that Varlamov knocked down with his glove, Palat gained possession, skated through the goal mouth and chipped the puck inside the left post.

The goal was Palat's third of the season and his first in five games since he returned from a lower-body injury that caused him to miss eight games.

"It was nice to see him get on the board early," Stamkos said. "Any time you can score early, especially coming back from injury, you feel a lot better about your game, so I think that helped him."

-- by Rick Sadowski for NHL.com --

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Actual Lineup

Colorado Avalanche lineup from this game