Kucherov was punished only at the very end of the match: the new-found hater of Tampa Tkachuk unceremoniously knocked Nikita off his feet, and then began to finish off the already lying Russian. For this, the Panthers forward received a double minor fine. =»mozallowfullscreen» allowfullscreen=»allowFullScreen» frameborder=»0″>It was this removal, by the way, that decided the outcome of the meeting. Tkachuk went to the penalty box along with Lightning defender Viktor Hedman, who received a two-minute penalty. The nuance was that the incident occurred already in overtime. For the Lightning, this situation meant getting the majority, and John Cooper's wards masterfully implemented the 4-on-3 format. Although for Tampa, everything could be completely different. On the one hand, the Lightning opened the scoring in the match thanks to the efforts of Nikita Kucherov, who assisted Steven Stamkos. The Canadian has already scored his seventh goal this season and has become the sole leader of the NHL sniper standings. On the other hand, the «lightning» did not even come close to having a playing advantage. Only in the first period, the “Panthers” threw the opponent with obvious superiority (18:8) and promptly leveled the score — it was Tkachuk who scored, which is symbolic. Later, Rudolf Balzers, with his goal, completely forced Tampa to recoup. It was possible to escape only in the middle of the third period, when Braden Point famously set up a stick after a throw from Kucherov.