Sunday, 4 a.m.
Sometimes, the road to day's success is a product of yesterday's disappointment.
At least, that's the way it worked out for the Tampa Bay Lighting on Saturday night.
The Bolts, fresh off an embarrassing performance in a loss to the Anaheim Ducks on Friday night, roared back to drub the San Jose Sharks 7-1 to again tie for the NHL lead in points. The Bolts scored four goals in the first period and coasted to the easy win.
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The Friday night loss was so bad that captain Steven Stamkos had talked about "a lack of emotion, a lack of focus and a lack of structure."
Saturday night, the Bolts had all of that. Six players scored goals in the win, which tied for the most goals by the team this season.
“I knew that was how we were going to respond," Stamkos said after the win over the Sharks. "We knew we didn’t have the effort at the beginning of the Anaheim game and we talked about it. Obviously we executed very well. To come out like that on a back-to-back and have that effort, that jump, was impressive. It was a nice, well-rounded game for us today.
“We knew. We’ve been in this position before where we don’t play to our standards and the next game you’re going to get our best."
Stamkos goal was his 20th of the season and gave him a team-leading 50 points.
Ross Colton scored twice. Mathieu Joseph, Brayden Point, Corey Perry and Alex Killorn all scored for the Bolts.
Backup goaltender Brian Elliot won in his first game in three weeis. He stopped 27 of 28 stos to raise his record to 4-2-2 on the season.
Colton has three goals in the last two games. He now has eight for the season.
"We didn’t perform to our expectations yesterday and Coop let us know that wasn’t the standard we have tot play to," Colton said..
The Bolts now return home. They will face the New Jersey Devils on Thursday night in a 7 p.m. game at Amalie Arena.