The New Jersey Devils began a challenging three-game road trip with a 4-3 overtime loss to the Tampa Bay Lightning at Amalie Arena on Thursday night.
On Thursday night, the New Jersey Devils began a challenging three-game road trip with a 4-3 overtime loss to the Tampa Bay Lightning at Amalie Arena.
New Jersey has two more road games versus the Florida Panthers and Boston Bruins before returning to Newark.
Dawson Mercer scored his 13th goal of the season 7:42 into the first period after receiving a beautiful drop pass from Erik Haula. Defenseman Colin Miller was credited with the secondary assist, his third of the season.
At 12:35 of the opening frame, Luke Glendening deflected Nick Perbix's shot to tie the game at 1-1.
Tampa celebrated their second goal with less than two minutes remaining in the period. While New Jersey was on the power play, Luke Hughes lost control of the puck in his own zone, turning it over to Glendening, who scored his second of the game.
By the conclusion of the first period, New Jersey had a 10-6 shot advantage but trailed 2-1.
The Lightning extended their lead to 3-1 after Brayden Point scored his 20th goal of the season on a delayed penalty 10:34 into the middle frame.
Jesper Bratt's 15th goal of the season pulled the Devils within one with a little over three minutes remaining. John Marino and Tyler Toffoli were credited with the assists. It was the 80th helper of Marino's career.
After 40 minutes, the Devils trailed 3-2.
In his 200th career NHL game, Nathan Bastian scores his second of the season 3:53 into the third period. The goal was unassisted.
New Jersey thought they earned their first lead of the night after Michael McLeod got the puck past Tampa goaltender Andrei Vasilevskiy. Unfortunately for New Jersey, the Lightning successfully won their challenge for the play being offside.
The game required extra time, and 1:52 into overtime, Lightning defenseman Darren Raddysh scored the game-winner, securing a 4-3 victory for Tampa.
Devils netminder Vitek Vanecek made 16 saves on 20 shots.
UP NEXT: The Devils will take on the Florida Panthers on Saturday at 6:00 P.M.
LINES:
Erik Haula - Nico Hischier - Dawson Mercer
Tyler Toffoli - Michael McLeod - Jesper Bratt
Chris Tierney - Curtis Lazar - Alexander Holtz
Max Willman - Shane Bowers - Nathan Bastian
Brendan Smith - Simon Nemec
Luke Hughes - John Marino
Kevin Bahl - Colin Miller
Vitek Vanecek