TORONTO (AP) — Brayden Point scored twice and the Tampa Bay Lightning routed the Toronto Maple Leafs 7-3 on Tuesday night in the opening game of the teams’ first-round playoff series.
Nikita Kucherov and Corey Perry each had a goal and two assists, and Anthony Cirelli and Ross Colton finished with a goal and an assist for Tampa Bay. Pierre-Edouard Bellemare also scored for the Lightning, who got four goals on the power play. Andrei Vasilevskiy made 28 saves in his 100th playoff start.
Ryan O’Reilly, William Nylander and Calle Jarnkrok scored for Toronto. Mitch Marner had three assists and Auston Matthews added two. Ilya Samsonov allowed six goals on 29 shots before being replaced by Joseph Woll at the start the third period. The rookie netminder finished with four stops.
Toronto winger Michael Bunting was whistled for a match penalty and game misconduct for an illegal check to the head of Tampa Bay’s Erik Cernak.
Game 2 in the best-of-seven series is Thursday night in Toronto.
RANGERS 5, DEVILS 1
NEWARK, N.J. (AP) — Igor Shesterkin stopped 27 shots, Chris Kreider scored two power-play goals New York stunned New Jersey in Game 1.
Vladimir Tarasenko, Ryan Lindgren and Filip Chytil also scored for the Rangers. Adam Fox had four assists and Artemi Panarin had two in this seventh renewal of this river rivalry in the postseason, the first since 2012.
The Devils, who set franchise records with 112 points and 52 wins in the regular season and beat New York three times in four games, never got their rush game going. When they did threaten, they either missed the net or Shesterkin denied them.
Their only goal came on a penalty shot by Jack Hughes with 2:46 left to play. Vitek Vanecek had 18 saves.
Game 2 is back here on Thursday night.
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AP NHL Playoffs: https://apnews.com/hub/stanley-cup and https://twitter.com/AP_Sports
