Bruins Wrap: Tyler Johnson’s Late Goal Hands Boston 3-2 Loss To Lightning

On Wednesday, the Bruins looked closer to their first victory inside the Toronto bubble than ever before.

But it wasn’t so.

Thanks to a Tyler Johnson goal at 18:33 in the third period, Boston fell to the Tampa Bay Lightning 3-2 at Scotiabank Arena in the second round-robin game for both teams.

Charlie McAvoy and Chris Wagner scored the Bruins’ goals. Brayden Point and Alex Killorn had the Lightning’s other tallies. Tuukka Rask made 32 saves for Boston, while Andrei Vasilevskiy turned away 25 shots for Tampa.

The Bruins now are 0-2-0 in round-robin play, while the Lightning are 2-0-0.

Here’s how it all went down:

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SLOW START
Those hoping the Bruins would put lackluster performances in Toronto behind them and open up with some jump wound up wildly disappointed with the first period effort.

After the Bruins (borderline inexplicably) passed up on a handful of fine enough shot opportunities early in the frame, the Lightning capitalized on a pair of chances.

Tampa got a 3-on-2 going after a shot from the point by Zdeno Chara was stopped and turned into a counter-attack. Nikita Kucherov fed a pass to Ondrej Palat, whose shot attempt was stopped by Rask. But the netminder left the puck in front of him and couldn’t locate it, and Point was waiting at the doorstep to poke it through Rask’s legs to make it 1-0 at 7:33.

Less than three minutes later and with Nick Ritchie serving a too many men on the ice penalty, the Bolts doubled their advantage off a double-deflection.

Victor Hedman ripped a one-time slapshot that quickly hit off Sean Kuraly. After the first deflection, the puck continued traveling toward the net, and Killorn allowed the puck to hit the inside of his right skate and carom into the goal at 10:32.

A few minutes before the horn, Torey Krug and Blake Coleman dropped the gloves after Krug took exception to a big hit Coleman laid on Brandon Carlo.

Despite going into the break down 2-0, the Bruins held a 9-8 shot advantage after one.

SHOWING LIFE
After a largely listless first period, the Bruins came out with more energy in the second and reaped the benefits accordingly.

With just under 3:30 to play, the Bruins got an offensive zone draw with the top line out, and Patrice Bergeron won the face-off. The pivot zipped the puck back to Torey Krug, who then slipped it over to McAvoy. The blueliner ripped a shot that, though untouched, weaved through plenty of traffic before beating Vasilevskiy at 16:43 to cut Boston’s deficit in half.

Tampa outshot Boston 11-9 in the second.

HEARTBREAKER
The two sides played much of the third period tied after the Bruins found a quick equalizer, but Tampa gave Boston a gut punch with 87 seconds to play.

A nice forechecking effort by Kuraly resulted in the fourth-line center winning the puck behind the net. With numbers favoring the Bruins, Kuraly sent a pass up to Chara at the point, and the defenseman sent a puck to the net. Vasilevskiy got a piece of it, but the puck got behind him and sat just in front of the goal line. A brief scrum ensued and Wagner managed to knock the tying goal home at 1:47.

The game looked destined for overtime, but the Lightning had other ideas.

Ryan McDonough held the puck all alone at his own blue line, then fed a pass to Boston’s blue line, which Killorn got a piece of and Yanni Gourde picked up for a clean entry. Gourde ripped a shot that Rask stopped, but left a rebound right as Johnson crashed in, and Johnson buried it with relative ease at 18:33.

UP NEXT
The Bruins will conclude their round-robin schedule Sunday against the Washington Capitals. The game time has not been set, but it will, of course, be played at Scotiabank Arena in Toronto.

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