Greetings to McKinnon from Kucherov

Nikita Kucherov reminded Nathan MacKinnon that it was too early for him to relax in the race for the Art Ross Trophy, despite his eight-point advantage.

In the next game day match with the Rangers, one of the Tampa leaders not only broke a goalless streak that lasted five meetings, but also completed four assists, thereby reducing the gap from the Colorado forward to just three points.

In this meeting, the Lightning players had to show remarkable character, as they completely failed in the opening twenty minutes.

The guests from New York outscored them more than twice and went into the break with a comfortable score of 2:0.

The first to score in the match was Artemy Panarin, who, like Kucherov, had not scored in five games before.

Vincent Trocheck made a great pass in that episode, and the Russian could only not miss the unprotected corner of Andrei Vasilevsky's goal.

For Tampa, things started to work out only in the second half of the match.

Finally, the first link worked properly.

Brayden Point robbed Johnny Brodzinski, fought back against Kucherov, and then left Igor Shesterkin in the dust.

And shortly before the second break, the Russian forward also took part in Anthony Duclair's goal.

But the third period turned out to be the brightest and most dynamic, in which five goals were scored at once.

At first, the Rangers took the lead again, but Kucherov and Point had their own plans for this game.

Within a minute and a half, the Canadian, with the help of the Russian, equalized the score, then helped Steven Stamkos score, and a little later scored a hat-trick - again with Nikita’s gorgeous pass.

It would have been unfair for the Maykop native to be left without a goal of his own in this game, and Point seemed to feel the same way.

A little over three minutes before the final siren, when the Rangers went all-in and took off the goalkeeper, Braden brought the Russian into an empty net, and he, of course, did not miss.

“I think they took [the outcome of] the first period personally, so to speak.

They have a great attitude that allows them to always win back.

Point earned six points, Kucherov five.

It’s not for nothing that these two are [one of] the best players in the world - they showed it today,” Stamkos praised his partners.

Now Kucherov has 39 goals this season, and he is just two steps away from repeating his personal record - in 2019, Nikita finished the regular season with 41 goals.

In addition, in this match the Russian surpassed the 70-assist mark for the third time in his career and took second place among active players in this indicator.

Only Connor McDavid is ahead of him with six such seasons.

And in terms of the number of games with five points, Kucherov now ranks fourth among active players in the league.

He has six, along with Leon Draisaitl, Brad Marchand and Sidney Crosby.

Only MacKinnon (7), Evgeni Malkin (8) and McDavid (11) have more.

Kuznetsov's breakthrough

Evgeny Kuznetsov needed four matches to open the scoring for Carolina.

The Russian was quite active in previous matches, but at some points he was unlucky or lacked game tone, but in the game with Florida everything worked out as it should.

In general, the match turned out to be quite difficult for the Hurricanes, despite the final score of 4:0 and a large advantage in shots on target (35 versus 21).

In the first period alone, Sergei Bobrovsky repelled 11 attacks, and the hosts managed to break through the Russian goalkeeper only 49 seconds before the break.

In the second twenty minutes, Carolina finally seized the initiative, which was embodied first in a goal by Martin Necas from a pass from Dmitry Orlov, and then in a puck by Kuznetsov.

The Russian received a pass in the free zone and aimed the puck between Bobrovsky's pads.

As Evgeniy later admitted, at first he wanted to pass the ball to Necas, but, having heard numerous shouts from the bench “Drop it!”, he followed the advice of his partners.

And then he celebrated the goal with his signature bird gesture.

In total, the Russian made four shots on target during the game, earned a utility coefficient of “+2” and was recognized as the first star of the match.

“I understand why I'm here.

They [the coaching staff] need results from us - ultimately, they need us to score goals and gain points, thereby helping the team.

I felt like we had to prove ourselves today.

I hadn't scored in the previous three games, so that was very important.

“Tonight I had a lot of fun,” Kuznetsov shared his impressions. 

And the final point in this meeting was put by Andrei Svechnikov, who hit the empty goal a few minutes before the end.

For the Russian, this goal was the 129th in his career, and he moved into sixth place in Carolina history among players 23 years old and younger, surpassing Eric Staal.

True, Andrei is unlikely to be able to climb the line higher than Jeff Sanderson (140), since he will turn 24 on March 26.

Samsonov's pass and Sorokin's 1400 saves

Ilya Samsonov repeated Toronto's record for the number of consecutive away matches won.

The team's victory over Philadelphia (6:2) was the Russian goalkeeper's seventh in a row, making him equal in this indicator with Jack Campbell (2020/21 season), Frederik Andersen (2018/19), as well as club legends Johnny Bauer (1960/61) and Turk Broda (1940/41).

In the reporting match, Samsonov made 26 saves and also recorded an assist.

It was the Russian who started the attack, which ended with a goal from Timothy Liljegren in the first period.

But Samsonov’s colleague from the Islanders, Ilya Sorokin, had a hard time in the game with Buffalo.

The Russian reflected 33 out of 37 shots, but the team suffered a defeat (0:4).

As New York head coach Patrick Roy noted after the match, the goalkeeper’s fault in this result was minimal, and if not for Ilya’s efforts, the score could have been more devastating.

Meanwhile, Sorokin became the first goalkeeper in the league to surpass the 1,400 save mark this season.

He achieved this milestone for the third time in his career and became the second in franchise history after Rick DiPietro to achieve such an achievement.

Sorokin currently has 1,431 saves, while his closest competitor, Nashville's Juuse Saros, has 1,378. If the Russian doesn't slow down, he could become the first Islanders goalie to finish the season with the most saves among all goalies.

Goals by Malkin and Kaprizov

Kirill Kaprizov extended his scoring streak to six matches.

During this period, he scored eight goals and made three assists.

The Minnesota forward scored another goal in the meeting with Anaheim.

At the beginning of the second period, the Russian brilliantly managed a pass from Ryan Hartman to the net, managing to throw the puck into the corner of the goal before Ducks goalkeeper Lukasz Dostal moved there.

This match also marked the debut for the Wild of another Russian who recently signed a contract with the club, Marat Khusnutdinov.

He spent almost 12 minutes on the court, but did not record any effective actions.

But I remember two wins in face-offs, which were greeted with enthusiastic applause by local fans.

In turn, Evgeni Malkin had a hand in Pittsburgh’s victory over San Jose (6:3).

The 37-year-old forward distinguished himself at a crucial moment, when the score in the match was equal, and helped the team tip the scales in their favor.

Midway through the second period, the Penguins launched a quick counterattack, Drew O'Connor shot on goal, and Malkin was first to finish.

For the native of Magnitogorsk, this goal was the 19th of the season, and only one accurate shot separates him from recording his 15th season with 20 goals or more.

Among active players, Patrick Kane has the same number, and only Sidney Crosby (16) and Alexander Ovechkin (18) have more.

The latter, by the way, did not show any effective actions in the next regular season match.