Kucherov danced his way to the right faceoff dot, pulling a Detroit defender toward him before cutting back to the right center hashmark. Kucherov shelved his shot into the top right corner of the Detroit net for his 21 st goal of the season.

The Tampa Bay Lightning took down the Detroit Red Wings 5-1 on Saturday night. Even though the Red Wings outshot the Lightning a lopsided 40 to 22, a strong night by the Lightning’s top line and goalie Andrei Vasilevskiy between the pipes allowed them to flip the script.

Some stat lines from this game spelled potential trouble for the Lightning. The Red Wings had gone 17-34 on the power play over their previous 10 games, and the Lightning put them on the power play six times. Also, Tampa Bay ceded most of the possession, allowing 40 shots on net and 77 shot attempts.

Nikita Kucherov had a goal and an assist in Tampa Bay's three-goal, second-period outburst over a 3:42 span as the host Lightning cooled off the torrid Detroit Red Wings, 5-1, on Saturday night.

Welcome back to NHL Predictions. Each day, Last Word on Hockey takes a look at the games that are scheduled and offers insight and analysis to help predict who will be victorious in head-to-head matchups.

Pregame analysis and predictions of the Tampa Bay Lightning vs. Toronto Maple Leafs NHL game to be played on January 20, 2025 on ESPN.