Kucherov scores early, Tomkins earns first NHL win as Lightning beat Canadiens

MONTREAL — Matt Tomkins waited a long time to earn his first NHL win. But he might not change a thing about the way it happened.

The 29-year-old Tomkins was drafted in the seventh round in 2012 but only made his first start last month in Ottawa, making stops in the East Coast Hockey League, American Hockey League and the Swedish Hockey League along the way.

On Tuesday night, the Edmonton native made 23 saves to backstop the Tampa Bay Lightning to a 5-3 win over the Montreal Canadiens for his first victory in an NHL net.

"Everything's been worth it to get to this point, a lot of questions along the way of 'am I doing the right thing?' and 'is this for me?' and there's been a lot of stops in getting here,” said Tomkins. “It's really special.”

The fact he did it in Montreal, at the Bell Centre, made it all the more meaningful considering he could look up and see his idol’s number in the rafters.

“Patrick Roy was actually the reason I became a goalie at 10 years old in the first place,” he said. “And then Carey Price was my favourite goalie growing up, so it's just an extra special thing to do it here in Montreal.”

"If you're gonna idolize some goalies in this league, the ones that have played here are pretty special,” added Lightning head coach Jon Cooper.

After losing in Tomkins’ first two starts, the Lightning did their best to secure a win in his third.

A red-hot Nikita Kucherov had a goal and an assist, Nick Paul scored twice, and Alex Barre-Boulet and Mikey Eyssimont also found the back of the net for Tampa Bay (6-3-4), which jumped out to a 4-0 lead a night after giving up a three-goal lead in a 6-5 overtime loss in Toronto.

Captain Nick Suzuki, Christian Dvorak and Michael Pezzetta replied for Montreal (5-5-2), which lost its fourth game in a row, and third in regulation.

Jake Allen allowed four goals on nine shots before getting the hook 13 minutes 50 seconds into the game.

Samuel Montembeault stopped 22 of 23 shots for Montreal in relief, but it was Tomkins’ night.

"What a thrill,” said Cooper. “If you were going to draw it up, I'm not sure you can draw it up any better than getting to play in the Bell Centre against the Montreal Canadiens."

Before some fans could take their seats, Kucherov opened the scoring with an effortless wrist shot over Allen’s right shoulder 22 seconds into the game for his 10th goal of the season.

“You get scored on in the first shift, we’re a bit of a fragile team right now,” said Canadiens head coach Martin St. Louis. “We’ve lost a bit of confidence, so that’s kind of what happened in the first period.”

Kucherov, a Hart Trophy winner as league MVP in 2019, entered the game one point back of the league lead and is up to 11 points in his last three games.

Paul made it 2-0 off a rebound at 7:15 of the first before Barre-Boulet, of Montmagny, Que., scored 1:54 later, finishing off a tick-tack-toe sequence on the power play in front of family and friends in the Bell Centre crowd.

On any another night, the game puck might have gone to him.

"I think it was a little more important for Tomkins," said Barre-Boulet.

Eyssimont added to Tampa’s advantage with 6:10 left in the first — and that was it for Allen.

The Canadiens settled things down in the second with Montembeault manning the crease.

First, he stoned Eyssimont on a breakaway. Minutes later, Kucherov danced through the Canadiens defence before setting up a wide-open Brayden Point, but Montembeault shut the door with a right-pad save on a deke to the backhand.

“It wasn’t an easy first period for anyone and it wasn’t necessarily Jake’s fault,” said St. Louis. “But Sam stepped in the net, and look, he did the job.”

Tomkins made a couple saves during a scramble in front with Tampa Bay on the penalty kill to keep his shutout bid alive in the third.

But Suzuki broke through at 6:50 of the period with a one-timer off a centring feed from Caufield to get Montreal on the board with a power-play goal.

Pezzetta made it 4-2 just 32 seconds later and Montreal built off that momentum for most of the period, but couldn’t break through with a third before Paul scored his second.

“I like that none of my players tried to hide, that they all tried to be part of the response,” said St. Louis. “I thought we refound ourselves a bit as a team on the confidence side in the second half of the game and I hope we can continue that in the next game.”

Dvorak got one back with 20 seconds left.

“It's too bad at the end we gave up that late one, but he's just grown,” said Cooper. “When you're watching this kid grow at 29 years old in the net, and wow, it was just great to be a part of that."

UP NEXT

Tampa Bay: Hosts the Chicago Blackhawks on Thursday.

Montreal: Visits the Detroit Red Wings on Thursday.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 7, 2023.