Tampa Crushes Pittsburgh

(Tampa) - The Lightning played the Penguins last night and finally some offence from a team that should be able to score goals. The final score was 8-2 and it all started with a huge 1st period. The Lightning came out with a mission to win and win big, thats what they accomplished tonight. They had 15 shots on net and 4 beat Aubin in a busy net for him in the first period. Varlomov, picked up in the Daze trade, started the scoring with a nifty move on the Pens defence and slid the puck past Aubin on the stick side. Cleary, with his 4th of the year, made it 2-0 at the 7 minute mark and 23 seconds later Pothier scored his 1st as a Bolt to make it 3-0. Varlamov scored another at 10:25 to make it a 4-0 score and Jillson had 3 assists in the period. Kraft scored at the 18:00 minute mark to give the Pens some life heading into the second period.
In the second, the Pens got another goal from Kraft early to make it a4-2 game but a PP goal by McLaren and a goal by Calder made the score 6-2 after 2 periods of play. Pens actually outshot the Bolts 13-7 but could only managed 1 goal and after allowing the 5th goal, Aubin was pulled in favour of Kidd. Kidd gave up one goal int he 2nd period.
In the 3rd, the Bolts once again fired a ton of rubber at Kidd and Hejduk got his 4th of the year and Cullen got his 1st to make the final 8-2. Thibault stopped all shots after Kraft scored his 2nd to get the win for the Bolts.
It was a good night for a few players. Varlamov and Jillson finished with 3 points each and both were a +3 for the night. Savard, Nylander, Kubina, Hejduk and Cullen all had 2 points on the night and the only minus player was Weight in the 6 minutes of ice time he had. On the farm, Springfield beat Wilkes-Barre 5-0 and Leclaire had a very strong game. Nielsen, who is waiting to get the call to the big league, had a goal and the team got balanced scoring from all lines.

Whats next?
Tampa are on the road to play the Buffalo Sabres. The Sabres always provide tough competition for the Bolts and Gm Sprackman is hoping that it will be 3 wins in a row for the Bolts since they lost Mario.