Senators post four-goal second period

TAMPA, Fla. (AP) -- The Ottawa Senators rebounded quickly from an unexpected defeat.

Todd White and Martin Havlat scored in the opening two minutes of Ottawa's four-goal second period as the Senators beat the Tampa Bay Lightning 6-3 in a matchup of divisional leaders Tuesday night.

Ottawa is 18-3-4 in its last 25 games. The Northeast Division-leading Senators were coming off a 3-2 loss Monday at Nashville, which is 10-17-6-4.

"I'm pleased from the standpoint that it's a good way to bounce back,'' Ottawa coach Jacques Martin said.

With the teams playing 4-on-4, White made it 2-0 at 52 seconds by scoring from the left circle during a 3-on-1. Havlat gave the Senators a three-goal lead from the slot at 1:59.

"We lost the game right there,'' Tampa Bay's Brad Richards said. "That's when they buried us. The snowball effect. Boom, boom, boom, it's 3-0.''

Ottawa took a 4-0 lead on Radek Bonk's second-period goal at 8:48. After Vincent Lecavalier scored for Tampa Bay at 10:16, Wade Redden's power-play goal with 7:19 left gave Ottawa a 5-1 lead.

"Last (Monday) night we had a tough time,'' Redden said. "We weren't shooting the puck. We just wanted to get the puck on net tonight.''

Tampa Bay, first in the Southeast Division, is winless (0-9-1) in its last 10 games against Ottawa.

"That's the best team we've seen,'' Lightning captain Dave Andreychuk said. "Flat out speed. They got a lot going for them.''

Mike Fisher put Ottawa ahead 1-0 at 8:16 of the first period. Havlat carried the puck behind the net and sent a pass to Fisher in the low slot. Fisher also had two assists.

"It's nice to get the points, but at the same time, as a team we wanted to battle back from last night and get a strong team effort,'' Fisher said. "We got production from a lot of lines. It was an exciting game to play in.''

Richards had a third-period goal, at 7:11, for Tampa Bay. He has a point in 13 of 14 games, notching five goals and 13 assists in that span.

Ottawa took a 6-2 lead just 68 seconds later on Chris Neil's goal.

"I thought we came out with a strong effort from the beginning,'' Ottawa captain Daniel Alfredsson said. "I thought we played real well in the first period. We were able to get some breaks early in the second scoring three quick goals and that kind of finished off the game right there.''

Tampa Bay's Ruslan Fedotenko made it 6-3 with 4:12 to play.

"They outplayed us. They jumped on us,'' Richards said. "We weren't ready to beat them.''

Game notes
Lightning G Nikolai Khabibulin was replaced by Kevin Hodson after Havlat's goal. Khabibulin allowed three goals on 16 shots. ... Ottawa D Karel Rachunek played after sitting out one game with a lower back bruise. ... Lightning LW Andre Roy returned after missing one game with blurred vision in his left eye.