Gostisbehere scores twice as Flyers beat Lightning

Tampa Bay's franchise-record winning streak saw a Ghost on Monday night at the reverberating Wells Fargo Center.

Shayne Gostisbehere scored two goals - setting a franchise record in the process - as the Flyers rallied past Tampa Bay, 4-2, and moved closer in the Eastern Conference playoff race.

"It's a fun ride," Gostisbehere said, "and I want to keep the ride going."

With 12 minutes, 39 seconds left, Gostisbehere scored from the right circle, one-timing a blast to give the Flyers their first lead of the night, 2-1. It ended the Flyers' 0-for-15 power-play slump and gave Gostisbehere 14 goals, setting a franchise record for a rookie defenseman.

"He's clutch. That's what he does," said captain Claude Giroux, who had two assists and set up Gostisbehere's second goal. "The power-play goal was a big goal, and even the five-on-five goal. I mean, we were getting a lot of shots, but it wasn't going in. It kind of made us relax a little bit."

Behn Wilson had the old record of 13 goals, set during the 1978-79 season.

"It's a tremendous honor; there's a lot of history," Gostisbehere said after the first two-goal game of his young career.

Brayden Schenn (two points) made it 3-1 with 6:03 left, knocking a shot off Steven Stamkos' leg and into the net. It was his eighth goal in the last 13 games - and it was needed.

Just 56 seconds later, Vladislav Namestnikov cut it to 3-2 by finishing off a slick pass from Tyler Johnson.

Wayne Simmonds secured the win with an empty-net goal with 26.5 seconds remaining.

The Flyers had a 40-18 shots domination as they ended Tampa Bay's nine-game winning streak and moved to within two points of Detroit and three points behind Pittsburgh in the battle for the two wild-card spots. All three teams have 17 games remaining.

The comeback victory ended a 5-1 homestand.

"It's huge for us to get points in every game we're playing now," Gostisbehere said. "Every game's a playoff game to us."

Gostisbehere tied it at 1 by scoring on a rebound with 3:09 left in a Flyers-dominated second period, one in which the hosts had a 22-6 shots advantage.

A little over a minute later, the Flyers pressured goalie Andrei Vasilevskiy, and in a wild five-second sequence, two shots hit iron and another somehow was turned aside by the Russian goalie.

Former Flyer Matt Carle broke his stick on a clearing attempt from behind the goal line, and his pass was intercepted by Ryan White, who alertly fed Pierre-Edouard Bellemare. The Frenchman fired a shot off the crossbar with 1:58 to go in the second. The puck dropped down near the right post, and Vasilevskiy then made a miraculous left-skate save on Chris VandeVelde's rebound attempt.

The puck caromed to Radko Gudas, whose blast from the top of the right circle smacked off the right post.

When the period ended, the Flyers had a 31-9 shots domination, but the score was tied at 1.

"I think we were a lot tighter defensively. Guys were playing the right way," said center Sean Couturier, who called it "one of our best 60-minute efforts" of the season. "We're more responsible and that's the way we should play if we want to win tight games."

Vasilevskiy had also made big saves on point-blank shots by Matt Read and Simmonds with just under six minutes left in the second.

But Gostisbehere, cheating on defense and sliding down near the goal, finally scored the equalizer.

A fortuitous bounce off the skate of former Lightning defenseman Gudas helped give Tampa an early 1-0 lead.

Defenseman Slater Koekkoek, recalled from the minors Monday to replace the injured Braydon Coburn, fired a shot that deflected off Gudas and went to a wide-open Ondrej Palat in the slot. Palat, who happens to be one of Gudas' best friends, beat Steve Mason for his third goal in the last two games.

The Flyers, sparked by their rookie phenom, carried the play the rest of the way.

"I'm learning more every day," said Gostisbehere, whose team has a rematch with the Lightning in Tampa on Friday. "I'm a sponge and I'm going to keep learning and hopefully get better."

scarchidi@phillynews.com

@BroadStBull