Nikita Kucherov delivered a dominant performance with a hat trick and two assists, leading the Tampa Bay Lightning to a 6-2 victory over the Seattle Kraken on Tuesday night.
Brandon Hagel added a goal and three assists, while Anthony Cirelli contributed a goal and two assists. Gage Goncalves also had a goal and an assist as Tampa Bay stayed within four points of first-place Buffalo in the Atlantic Division.
Seattle got goals from Bobby McMann and Jared McCann. The Kraken are tied with the Los Angeles Kings at 71 points in the race for the final Western Conference playoff spot.
Kucherov, a six-time All-Star, opened his scoring late in the first period and struck less than a minute again into the second to give Tampa Bay a 3-0 lead. He later completed his sixth career hat trick with an empty-net goal late in the third, marking his 37th of the season.
The performance marked Kucherov’s second multi-goal outing of the month and his seventh of the season.
Seattle briefly pushed back in the second period, scoring twice to cut the deficit to 3-2. McMann, recently acquired from Toronto, continued his strong start with his fourth goal in three games. McCann then brought the Kraken within one by beating Andrei Vasilevskiy with a slick move.
That would be as close as Seattle would get. Cirelli extended Tampa Bay’s lead early in the third with a wraparound goal, and Hagel added a power-play tally later in the period.
Vasilevskiy made 16 saves for the Lightning, while Philipp Grubauer stopped 19 shots for Seattle.
Up Next
-
Lightning: Visit Vancouver on Thursday night.
-
Kraken: Travel to Nashville to face the Predators on Thursday night.
