Music: {allcanada} Maple Leafs top Lightning on van Riemsdyk's goal

Tuesday, January 28, 2014

{allcanada} Maple Leafs top Lightning on van Riemsdyk's goal

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James van Riemsdyk's tie-breaking goal with 4:03 remaining in the third period gave the Toronto Maple Leafs a 3-2 victory against the Tampa Bay Lightning on Tuesday night.

Tyler Bozak forced a turnover in the Lightning zone and fed Phil Kessel, who found van Riemsdyk alone in the slot for a wide-open snap shot that beat Ben Bishop. The play was originally ruled no goal on the ice, but a video review showed that the shot had hit the back bar at the top of the net, rather than the post, giving van Riemsdyk his 21st goal of the season.

Jonathan Bernier made 40 saves for Toronto, including a game-saver on a wide-open one-timer by Martin St. Louis from the lower right circle with 3:17 remaining. Ben Bishop made 23 stops for Tampa Bay, which saw its three-game winning streak end.

Toronto (28-21-6) closed within five points of the second-place Lightning (31-17-5) in the Atlantic Division.

Nazem Kadri scored twice in the first half of the second period for Toronto, but goals by Matt Carle and Matt Barberio in a 3:59 span late in the period got the Lightning even.

The Lightning outshot Toronto 11-8 in a scoreless first period during which neither team generated many high-quality chances, even though the Maple Leafs had three power plays. That changed quickly in the second period.

Kadri opened the scoring at 1:49 on a fine individual effort. He picked off a pass just outside his own blue line, raced down the left side and used Tampa Bay defenseman Victor Hedman as a screen as he fired a shot that beat Bishop for an unassisted goal.

Kadri made it 2-0 a little less than eight minutes later with another fine effort. Joffrey Lupul batted a pass to Kadri in the left circle; he toe-dragged past Hedman, cut to the front of the net and deked Bishop before tucking home a backhander at 9:47 for his 14th goal and ninth point in seven games.

A holding penalty to Toronto's Peter Holland 60 seconds after Kadri's second goal appeared to spark the Lightning, who hit two posts during the power play and scored less than 30 seconds after it ended. Carle took a pass from Ondrej Palat in the slot, stepped to his left and whipped a shot past Bernier at 13:13 for his second of the season.

The Lightning couldn't capitalize on a second power play, but they kept controlling the play and tied the game at 17:12 when Barberio slammed home a rebound after Bernier stopped shots by Nate Thompson and B.J. Crombeen but got no help in clearing the rebound. It was the fourth goal for the rookie defenseman, all of which have come in the past four games.

Tampa Bay outshot Toronto 18-8 in the second period and 27-16 through 40 minutes.

Kessel missed a chance to put Toronto back in front 3:25 into the third period when he raced in alone on Bishop but fired wide.

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