Bolts fall to Ducks in overtime, 4-3

Taking a glass half-empty or half-full approach on nights like Thursday can be a double negative no matter how it's viewed.

On one end of the spectrum, the Lightning kept their streak of games without a regulation loss to seven and battled back from three goals down. At the other end, however, was a 4-3 overtime loss to Anaheim, Tampa Bay's seventh overtime or shootout loss of the season with three of the Ducks' four goals coming on the power play, the last by Scott Niedermayer with the man advantage 52 seconds into overtime.

"It's disappointing to lose," said goaltender Mike Smith, who stopped 23 shots. "But you can look at it a couple of ways because we did battle back against a pretty good team and on the road every point is big, so that's a big point to battle back for."

The Lightning improved to 4-0-3 in the past seven games, 6-1-5 in the past 12 and are unbeaten in regulation (3-0-2) in their past five games on the road.

While there was plenty to be encouraged about after Tampa Bay fell behind 3-0 early in the second period, Lightning coach Rick Tocchet lamented the seven penalties his team took, with Ryan Malone taking a questionable cross checking call on the opening shift of overtime to set up the winner.

"Five-on-five, I thought we played well and I think that was a hard-fought point for us," Tocchet said. "But we give up three power play goals, take a couple of dumb penalties, but other than that I felt we worked hard.'

The Ducks, coming off an 0-3-1 road trip through the Eastern time zone, came out of the gate aggressively, chasing down pucks with a vengeance. While the Lightning found a way early on to counter that aggression and create scoring chances, it was Anaheim who landed on the board first.

Three seconds after a power play expired, Ryan Getzlaf threaded a pass through the crease to a wide-open Teemu Selanne at the right post for a tap-in goal at 6:25 of the first period. The Ducks would be held off the shot clock for a span of 11 minutes, 47 seconds but the Lightning would fail to find the net behind Jonas Hiller.

Unfortunately for Tampa Bay, the Ducks' next shot on goal was a carbon copy of their previous, with Selanne threading a pass through the crease to Getzlaf for a power play goal with 1:48 left in the first period.

Anaheim took a 3-0 lead with its second power play goal of the night, this one coming from Bobby Ryan, who took a David Hale high stick to the face that gave the Ducks a four-minute power play, with Ryan's goal coming on the back end at the 6:52 mark.

"Taking some of the aggressive penalties, I don't mind, but what I have a tough time with is some of the careless stick penalties," Tocchet said. "You can't give up seven power plays and expect to win too many nights."

Before the goal could be announced over the public address system, however, Tampa Bay struck back 31 seconds later. Jeff Halpern scored his second of the season on a pass from Steve Downie, who drew a penalty and from his knees behind the net fed a pass to Halpern at 7:23. Rookie defenseman Victor Hedman picked up the second assist on the play for his first point in 13 games dating, back to Oct. 12.

Steven Stamkos cut the lead to one 18 seconds after Halpern's goal with a highlight reel tally. After taking the initial shot, and losing his balance in the process, Stamkos smacked the puck out of the air as he was falling to the ice and put it past a surprised Hiller at 7:41 of the second period.

"I think that play was probably more luck than anything else," Stamkos said. "I actually thought I should have scored on the first shot, it was a nice set up there from Vinny (Lecavalier), but I saw the puck up in the air there and I was kind of falling backwards so I thought I would just take a whack at it. I was lucky enough that it hit my stick and went it."

On the play, Malone, who finished the game with two assists, extended his scoring streak to a season-long five games.

With nearly a full power play to start the third period, Marty St. Louis, who has been moved back to point position with the man advantage, fired a slap shot through traffic that caromed off the inside of the left post and into the net 1:38 into the third period to bring the Lightning back from the three-goal deficit.

Tampa Bay had some chances to win the game before even getting to overtime, including a power play of its own with just over four minutes left in the third period and a nice chance by Paul Szczechura on a feed from James Wright with just over a minute to go. But St. Louis said the Lightning can't put themselves in a position to have to kill off so many penalties.

"There's always going to be questionable calls, but you have to stay out of the penalty box, especially against a team like that has the players they do," he said. "You don't want to put yourself into a vulnerable position to get a call against you."