Lightning 5, Rangers 1: Ryan Callahan scored twice in his return to Madison Square Garden as Tampa Bay improved to 8-1-1 in its last 10 games.

Steven Stamkos netted his 12th goal to pull into a three-way tie with New York's Rick Nash and Dallas' Tyler Seguin for the league lead. Stamkos added two assists, Nikita Kucherov had his seventh tally in 12 contests and Alex Killorn also scored for the Lightning, who moved within one point of idle Montreal for the top mark in the league.

Martin St. Louis scored his sixth goal in eight contests while facing the club with which he spent parts of 13 seasons before being acquired by the Rangers for Callahan prior to last season's trade deadline. New York failed to solve Ben Bishop (15 saves) again and fell for the seventh time in nine outings (2-3-4).

After St. Louis was denied on a partial breakaway, Tampa Bay benefited from quick diagonal passes by Tyler Johnson and Ondrej Palat before Kucherov's wrist shot trickled past Henrik Lundqvist (25 saves) at 6:50 of the first period. The Lightning doubled the advantage 7 1/2 minutes later as Stamkos stickhandled around Carl Hagelin before feeding Callahan, who pushed defenseman Dan Girardi before converting from the right doorstep.

St. Louis scored a power-play goal as his attempted centering feed caromed off the stick of Tampa Bay defenseman Jason Garrison and into the net just 32 seconds into the middle session. Stamkos scored on a partial breakaway with 5:52 remaining in the session, Killorn tallied from the right circle at 18:42 and Stamkos stripped defenseman Marc Staal before setting up Callahan in front with 2:51 left in the third.

GAME NOTEBOOK: Tampa Bay D Anton Stralman blocked a team-high five shots and C Brian Boyle logged 14:01 in their respective returns to Madison Square Garden. Stralman signed a five-year, $20.5 million deal and Boyle inked a three-year, $9.4 million pact in the offseason. ... Callahan was drafted by the Rangers in 2004 and named their captain prior to the 2011-12 campaign before signing a six-year, $34.8 million deal with the Lightning in the summer. ... Lightning C Valtteri Filppula, Palat and Johnson each had two assists. ... Stamkos has scored four goals and set up five others during his six-game point streak.