Best of NHL: League-best Lightning spoil Ben Bishop's return

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TAMPA, Fla. -- Steven Stamkos had two goals and two assists, Andrei Vasilevskiy made 27 saves to beat his mentor Ben Bishop, and the Tampa Bay Lightning beat the Dallas Stars 6-1 Thursday night.

Vasilevskiy was Bishop's backup in Tampa Bay for parts of three seasons until Bishop was dealt to Los Angeles last February. Bishop holds the Lightning career wins record with 131, while Vasilevskiy has gone 26-5-3 since taking over the starting role. This was Bishop's first game against Tampa Bay since the trade.

Stamkos has 10 goals and an NHL-best 35 points after missing most of last season with a lateral meniscus tear.

Mikhail Sergachev, Brayden Point, Jake Dotchin and Nikita Kucherov also scored for the Lightning, who have the NHL's best record at 15-2-2.

Dallas, which went 0-2-1 on a three-city, four-day trip, got a goal from Radek Faksa. Bishop stopped 22 shots (see full recap).
    
Wild use 4 late goals to rally past Predators
ST. PAUL, Minn. -- Jason Zucker scored with 2:55 left and the Minnesota Wild scored four goals in less than six minutes in the third period to beat the Nashville Predators 6-4 on Thursday night.

Jared Spurgeon scored twice and Eric Staal had a goal and two assists for Minnesota, which won its fourth straight.

On the winner, Mikko Koivu fought off a defenseman into the left corner and centered to Zucker in front. With two defenders nearby, Zucker sent a backhand shot past Pekka Rinne for his eighth goal in five games.

Spurgeon added an empty-net goal. Matt Dumba and Nino Niederreiter also scored.

Wild goaltender Devan Dubnyk with a franchise-record shutout streak of 195 minutes, 5 seconds. That ended 49 seconds in when Ryan Johansen converted a pass from Filip Forsberg, the first goal allowed by Dubnyk on 108 shots. He finished with 26 saves.

Roman Josi, Mattias Ekholm and Viktor Arvidsson also scored for Nashville, which lost for the first time in six games (see full recap).

Coyotes battle back for 1st regulation win
MONTREAL -- Derek Stepan and Christian Fischer scored power-play goals in the third period and the Arizona Coyotes rallied to beat the Montreal Canadiens 5-4 on Thursday night for their first regulation victory of the season.

Brad Richardson, Christian Dvorak and Tobias Rieder also scored for the Coyotes, and Antti Raanta made 33 saves. Arizona snapped a five-game losing streak to improve to 3-15-3.

Brendan Gallagher, Paul Byron, Joe Morrow and Shea Weber scored for the Canadiens, and Charlie Lindgren stopped 27 shots.

With the Coyotes down 4-3 in the third period, Stepan got Arizona level for the third time in the game with a wrist shot from the crease at 4:54 following a failed clearance by Jordie Benn. Gallagher was in the box for tripping.

Arizona scored again on the power play at 10:10, this time with Weber penalized for slashing, when Brendan Perlini's shot ricocheted off Fischer's stick and in.

Rieder made it 3-3 with 51 seconds left in the second, but Weber answered back 40 seconds later.

The Coyotes scored five goals for the first time this season. They had a combined five goals in their previous four games (see full recap).

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