Guentzel Scores Lone Goal, Vatrano Scores Twice In 4-1 Victory

Tampa Bay Lightning celebrating a goal
Photo: William Liang

The Lightning’s downward spiral continued Sunday, January 5th, suffering a 4-1 defeat at the hands of the Anaheim Ducks at Honda Center. Jake Guentzel’s goal provided a fleeting moment of brilliance, but it was ultimately a solitary spark in an otherwise dismal performance as Tampa Bay took their fourth straight loss. Frank Vatrano, who earlier in the day signed a three-year contract extension with Anaheim, fueled the Ducks’ victory with a pair of goals, while John Gibson, a stalwart in the net, earned his 200th NHL career win, making 33 saves to guide the Ducks to victory. This has been the first time this season that the Lightning lost four straight games in regulation. On Tuesday, the Lightning will head home to host the Carolina Hurricanes in search of a win to snap their losing streak, while the Ducks hope to grab another two points when they host the Calgary Flames.

Tampa Bay Lightning Lineup:

Guentzel – Point – Kucherov

Hagel – Cirelli – Geekie

Chaffee – Paul – Eyssimont

Girgensons – Glendening – Goncalves

Hedman – Raddysh

McDonagh – Cernak

Lilleberg – Perbix

Johansson

Vasilevskiy

Anaheim Ducks Lineup:

Vatrano – Strome – Terry

Killorn – Carlsson – Leason

Gauthier – McTavish – Fabbri

Harkins – Lundestrom – Nesterenko

Dumoulin – Trouba

LaCombe – Gudas

Zellweger – Helleson

Gibson

Dostal

   Getting the party started, Troy Terry opened the scoring at 14:36 of the first period to put Anaheim ahead 1-0 with his 14th goal of the season. Terry took Ryan Strome’s drop pass at the blue line, scoring on a wrister from the right circle after slowly skating to it, and it went in off Jonas Johansson’s arm. The Lightning did not record their first shot on goal until 9:24 on the clock in the first frame. With little time left in the opening 20, Jacob Trouba fired the puck from above the left circle and Frank Vatrano tipped it in to find the back of the net, extending the Ducks’ lead to 2-0 with 2:57 left to play in the first period.

   Jake Guentzel struck the one and only goal for Tampa Bay with 10:48 remaining in the middle frame to cut it to 2-1. After some passing back and forth, Guentzel sent the puck over to Nikita Kucherov, who moved down below the right circle before passing it back to Guentzel, who was originally behind the net. Guentzel then buried a one-timer for his 21st goal of the season after skating into the right circle on the power play.

   With 3:34 remaining in the third, Jackson LaCombe pushed it to 3-1 off Alex Killorn’s pass as they both drove up into Tampa Bay’s zone on a 2-on-1, and LaCombe found the back of the net with a one-timer for his eighth of the season. Frank Vatrano struck his second of the night with little time left in regulation when he scored on the Lightning’s empty net for the 4-1 final.

Notes:

– Jonas Johansson made a total of 22 saves for Tampa Bay.

– Erik Cernak skated in his 400th NHL career game.

– Both Nikita Kucherov and Brayden Point recorded the assists on Jake Guentzel’s goal.

– The Lightning outshot the Anaheim Ducks 32-24 in the final two periods.

– The Lightning had won the eight previous games against the Anaheim Ducks.

– Tampa Bay was 1-for-1 on the penalty kill, and they haven’t allowed a power-play goal in their past six games; 14-for-14.

– Troy Terry recorded a goal and picked up an assist, and Ryan Strome collected a pair of assists. …With his two assists, Strome extended his point streak to five games; two goals and five assists.

ITR 37: Round Two Inside The Rink

Join Chris and Conrad as they see how they did on their first round predictions, along with laying out their second round thoughts. Picking winners for Round Two!
  1. ITR 37: Round Two
  2. ITR 36: Coaching Carousel
  3. ITR 35: Round One
  4. ITR 34: End Of The Road
  5. ITR 33: The Gr8 One

Discover more from Inside The Rink

Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.

Leave a Reply

NHL Playoff Preview: Dallas Stars at Winnipeg Jets with Line Combinations (05/09/2025)

Dallas Stars (5-3-0) at Winnipeg Jets (4-4-0)Venue: Canada Life CentreDate: Tonight – Friday, May 9thTime: 8:30 pm CST TV: Sportsnet, CBC, TVAS, ESPNRadio: 680 CJOB (Winnipeg) & KTCK-AM (Dallas) Purchase tickets via Ticketmaster DraftKings Sportsbook Betting Lines:Dallas Stars +1.5 ML -102Winnipeg Jets -1.5 ML -118O/U 5.5 Dallas Stars News & Notes: The Dallas Stars got […]

Read More
Mikko Rantanen skating for the Dallas Stars

Opinion: Stars’ Mikko Rantanen Returns to Form At the Right Time

It was clear that Mikko Rantanen was not exactly about being traded by the Colorado Avalanche, the only NHL club he had ever known. It was in Colorado where he spent close to 11 seasons, won a Stanley Cup in 2022, had 681 points (287 goals and 394 assists), and made lifelong friends. That is […]

Read More

Edmonton Oilers Playoff Thoughts: Round 2, Game 2

It takes four wins to advance, but the Edmonton Oilers historically lose almost every Game 1. In their last 15 rounds, including Tuesday night, they’ve won only four series openers. Even in 2006, they only won one Game 1. If you include that Playoff run, just for laughs, the record is 5 Game 1 wins […]

Read More