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 Johnson marveled at the winner, a strong solo effort by captain
Steves Stamkos, in a 4-2 victory over the Ottawa Senators at
Canadian Tire Centre. It reminded him of a similar stroll Detroit's
Gustav Nyquist took in the Senators zone for an overtime winner just
after Christmas.
"That's impressive," Johnson said of Stamkos' 21st of the season,
which came 47 seconds after his own 14th of the campaign tied the
game late in the second period. "I don't know too many guys in the
league who can do that goal. Just moving his feet the entire time.
It's fun to watch. It looked a little bit like Nyquist there, if you
guys remember seeing that one. It was nice, it was really nice. It
got the guys going, for sure. It was awesome for him to do that
because he's been working hard."
Johnson said Senators defenseman Erik Karlsson was equally
impressed.
"I think after that goal Karlsson came by the bench and gave a
little look like, 'wow, that was pretty good,'" said Johnson. "I
think if anybody is able to do that, it's pretty sweet."
 The win was Tampa's fifth in six games and put the Lightning in a
first-place tie with the Montreal Canadiens atop the Eastern
Conference standings.
The Senators, who are trying to catch up in the race for a wild-card
spot, were foiled in an attempt to stretch their own victory streak
to three games for the first time since the opening week of the
season.
Defenseman Victor Hedman had the other Lightning goal while center
Kyle Turris and winger Mark Stone replied for the Senators.
The Lightning outshot the Senators 30-21 in a battle between former
Ottawa teammates Ben Bishop and Robin Lehner.
Playing the second of back-to-back games, the Senators took nine
penalties but only gave up one power-play goal. Ottawa's power play
went 0-for-3 and is now 0-for-21 in the last six games.
"Little bit tired, little bit undisciplined," Senators coach Dave
Cameron said of his team. "Combination of both led to way too many
penalties."
The Senators opened the scoring 32 seconds in on Turris' ninth of
the season and second in two games. Lehner kept them in front until
Hedman ended a flurry of activity around the Ottawa net with a
silencing slapper at the 3:48 mark of the second.
"The energy wasn't there," said Lehner. "I think our two most
dangerous shifts came at the beginning of the first and second, and
then it fell off.
"It shouldn't happen. I think we can stay in these games with these
tops teams, but today we made it easy for them. Give too much space
to these guys, and you're not going to win."
Stone's ninth of the season, a wrister past Bishop's stick side at
7:30 of the period, restored the Senators lead. But Johnson scored
on the power play after a nice setup by winger Nikita Kucherov at
16:08 of the season, then Stamkos put the visitors in the front to
stay.
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"Things haven't been going great lately so I was just trying to work
hard tonight," said Stamkos, who entered the game with points in
just one of his previous six outings. "On that one, I just got the
puck on the side wall and just tried to make a play. I used my speed
and I used my strength to take it to the net. It was good to see
that one go in and hopefully get things rolling."
Turris, who was in pursuit of Stamkos, blamed himself for the goal.
"I made a terrible play on Stamkos there behind the net," said
Turris. "Can't let that happen. You can't chase the game like that.
I've got to be better."
Johnson's second of the night, again on a pretty set up by Kucherov,
was the only goal of the final period that saw the Senators test
Bishop just five times.
"We knew this game was for the taking," said Lightning coach Jon
Cooper. "We're down 1-0, but we felt Lehner made some pretty good
saves. We had some pretty good looks. They just weren't going in for
us.
"When you're in this league, you understand what back-to-backs can
do to teams. We've had it done to ourselves. We knew their energy
level wasn't going to get any higher than it was in the first and if
we could just keep going, we could wear them down and eventually we
did."
NOTES: Lightning D Radko Gudas was sent back to Tampa for
re-evaluation of a lower-body injury, which means not only did he
miss the Ottawa game but he will also miss Tuesday's game in
Montreal, at least. ... Senators G Robin Lehner was making his first
start since a 4-1 loss in Montreal on Dec. 20. He was one of about
five Senators who battled a bout with the flu over the Christmas
break ... Lightning C Tyler Johnson reminds Lehner of former Tampa
captain Martin St. Louis. "I know Johnson is going to be a superstar
in this league," said Lehner, who remembers him well from their days
in the AHL. "He's so smart out there." Johnson started the night as
the NHL's plus-minus leader at plus-26. ... Senators D Chris Wideman
was the team's lone scratch. Wideman, who leads the AHL's Binghamton
Senators with 12 goals and 29 points, is with the big team as
insurance.
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