Canadian Press

TAMPA, Fla. (CP) - Vincent Lecavalier picked the perfect forum to make a statement about leadership and physical play to the Tampa Bay Lightning.

Lecavalier assisted on two goals and set the tone with some big hits on the opening shift as the Lightning routed the Calgary Flames 4-1 to even the Stanley Cup final series on Thursday night.

The best-of-seven NHL championship series is tied 1-1 and shifts to Calgary for Game 3 on Saturday night and Game 4 on Monday night. The Flames are 4-5 at home in the playoffs.

Ruslan Fedotenko scored in the first period, while Brad Richards, Dan Boyle and Martin St. Louis scored in the third for the Lightning, who are 12-1 in the playoffs when scoring first.

Ville Nieminen scored in the third period for Calgary.

``I've been trying to play more physical in the last five or six games,'' said Lecavalier, whose team used speed and hitting to keep Calgary on its heels. ``I saw what (Keith) Primeau did (for Philadelphia) in our last series and how he was hitting everybody and I tried to do some of that.

``It gets you in the game.''

When asked what his team has to do better in Game 3, Flames coach Darryl Sutter said ``win.

``In the first period, other than Jarome (Iginla), we had some skilled players that weren't as effective in tough areas as their skilled players.''

While Calgary dominated a jittery Tampa Bay side in winning the series opener 4-1 on Tuesday night, a hungrier, more aggressive Lightning turned up in Game 2.

Their best players, mostly absent from Game 1, stepped up in the rematch, led by Lecavalier, Richards and St. Louis, who kept pressure in the Calgary zone. Tampa Bay outshot the visitors 31-19.

And among the record crowd of 22,222 at the St. Pete Times Forum was Hall of Famer Wayne Gretzky, the executive director of Team Canada who left Lecavalier off this summer's World Cup team.

``Seriously, I'm only concentrating on our goal of winning the Stanley Cup,'' said Lecavalier. ``Being picked for Team Canada would have been an honour and playing in front of Wayne Gretzky is an honour. It motivates you, but my motivation now is the Stanley Cup, not the World Cup.''

It was also a redemption for Boyle, whose south Tampa house suffered $300,000 US in fire damage while his team was being manhandled by the Flames in Game 1.

``It was awesome,'' the Ottawa native said. ``Obviously, it's been a rough couple of days.

``Sleeping hasn't been very good. The second we stepped off the ice after the last game, we knew we hadn't done enough. Tonight I think we came out a lot harder and with a lot more desperation.''

The Lightning got the first goal after some dogged work by Lecavalier, who made a Gretzky-like move in playing the puck off the back of the Calgary net to beat his checker Stephane Yelle.

He then fed Jassen Cullimore at the point for a shot, from which Fedotenko pushed his own rebound behind the sprawled Miikka Kiprusoff at 7:10.

It was the first time in 10 games Calgary allowed a goal in the first period and was only their fifth opening-period goal allowed in these playoffs.

Kiprusoff kept his team in the game in the second period, thwarting Richards on a short-handed breakaway in the second minute and twice stopping Lecavalier on quick shots after faceoffs.

But renewed Tampa Bay pressure to start the third frame opened the floodgates.

``I thought about taking him out when it was 4-0, just to give him the rest, but he was fine,'' Sutter said of Kiprusoff. ``I don't think he was an issue.''

Richards picked up a loose puck and beat Kiprusoff 2:51 into the third period. The goal was Richards' sixth game-winning goal of the playoffs, tying him with Joe Sakic of Colorado (1996) and Joe Nieuwendyk of Dallas (1999) for the most ever.

``The goal tonight was good to get us that two-goal cushion,'' said Richards.

Boyle tipped in Richards' pass from the corner at 4:00 to make it 3-0.

St. Louis finished a tic-tac-toe play with Lecavalier and Dave Andreychuk on a power play at 5:58.

Nieminen picked the puck away from Cory Stillman and scored from the slot on a power play at 12:21 to make it 4-1.

Much of the final period turned into brawling. Tampa Bay's Chris Dingman was ejected after instigating a fight with Chris Simon and Calgary's Martin Gelinas took a cross-checking major and game misconduct for breaking his stick across defenceman Pavel Kubina with 12 seconds left to play.

The Lightning have not lost twice in a row in the playoffs thus far. They are also 7-0 in the playoffs when Richards scores a goal. They were 22-0-2 in the regular season when he scored. They also have a power play goal in eight consecutive games.