Lightning score late in regulation, late in OT to top Sabres

Jake Guentzel scored a breakaway goal with 15 seconds left in overtime as the Tampa Bay Lightning won their ninth straight home game, beating the Buffalo Sabres 4-3 on Tuesday night.

Nikita Kucherov spun and fired a half-length-of-the-ice pass to Guentzel, who snared it and beat Buffalo goaltender Colten Ellis (31 saves) for his second straight game-winner.

Kucherov increased his point streak to nine games (six goals, 17 assists) with a tally and three helpers.

Tampa Bay’s Darren Raddysh scored a goal in his fifth straight game — tying the contest with 26 seconds left in regulation — and also had an assist.

Guentzel logged two points, and teammate Oliver Bjorkstrand tallied on the man advantage. Goaltender Andrei Vasilevskiy stopped 23 shots as the Lightning improved to 18-1-1 in the past 20 games.

Buffalo’s Mattias Samuelsson hit double figures in goals with two markers, and Josh Doan scored on the power play. However, the Sabres fell to 6-1-1 in the past eight after splitting their back-to-back Florida trip.

Midway through the first period, Buffalo defenseman Rasmus Dahlin broke his stick, and Jason Zucker handed him his — a much more curved stick used by the forward. Dahlin tried to advance the puck with a weak pass, and Kucherov quickly stole it for a marker at 10:24.

Late in the frame, Vasilevskiy robbed Ryan McLeod’s rebound attempt, but Samuelsson rifled in the tying goal at 16:53 from a sharp angle after skating unimpeded through the left circle.

In the second, a diving Vasilevskiy reached out to deny a chance near the post by Alex Tuch at 5:24 after the Buffalo forward stole the puck on the goalie’s pass from behind the cage.

After Ellis’ stop on Brandon Hagel in the third, McLeod fed Samuelsson, who skated into the high slot and blistered a shot past Vasilevskiy on the glove side at 4:08. Bjorkstrand matched it by netting his eighth power-play goal of the season at 8:53.

With just two seconds left in the Sabres’ third power play, Tage Thompson fed a pass that Doan chipped in from the blue paint for the go-ahead marker at 14:53.

The contest opened the teams’ four-game season series.

–Field Level Media