The Vancouver Canucks played well enough to win Tuesday night, but fell victim to a pair of red-hot hockey players in Antero Niittymaki and Martin St. Louis.

Niittymaki kicked out 39 shots and St. Louis tallied twice in the third period, including the short-handed winner, as the Tampa Bay Lightning struck down the Canucks 3-1 before a crowd of 14,226 at the St. Pete Times Forum.

"Niitty made some big saves for us, and I thought we came out strong and played some pretty good minutes in the third [period]," St. Louis said. "We got some goals."

St. Louis also earned an assist, while Steven Stamkos contributed a goal and assist for the Lightning (26-21-11), winners of four straight games and seven of their last nine (7-1-1).

It is Tampa Bay's first four-game winning streak since November 2007, and coincides with Niittymaki's recent hot streak, which has seen him go 7-0-1 in eight starts.

"He has been definitely earning his keep," Tampa Bay head coach Rich Tocchet said. "We just keep getting great play from him."

"It took us close to 40 minutes to solve him and he shut the door in the third," Canucks forward Ryan Kesler conceded. "We had some real good chances, but we just couldn't find a way to beat him."

Kesler blasted a shot by Niittymaki on a power play for what was the lone goal for the Canucks (35-21-2), now 2-3 on their eight-game, pre-Olympic road trek.

"We want to make sure we are better than .500 on the road trip," Canucks netminder Roberto Luongo said. "Our road record is not where we want it to be and we have to find ways to be better on the road."

Sandwiching eight-game and six-game road swings around the Olympic break means the Canucks will not have played at General Motors Place for 42 straight days.

Fourteen straight games on the road constitutes an NHL record and the Canucks will need more from the Sedin twins if they hope to make the most of it.

Henrik and Daniel Sedin, who lead the team with 78 and 52 points, respectively, have combined for one assist through the first five games of the trip.

"We played a pretty good game," Canucks forward Daniel Sedin said. "It was a step in the right direction.

"When you're in a tough stretch like this, you've got to play good defensively and make the simple play."

'We're playing great as a team'

Vancouver had several chances to open the scoring early in the first period, with both Mikael Samuelsson and Henrik Sedin ringing shots off the left post and Steve Bernier clanking a shot off the crossbar behind Niittymaki.

At the other end, Stamkos staked Tampa Bay to a 1-0 lead eight minutes into the contest, firing a wrist shot from the faceoff circle past Luongo for his 31st goal this season.

Stamkos has points in each of his past 10 games, compiling eight goals and eight assists over that span.

"We're playing great as a team right now," he said. "It feels good to contribute, especially this time of the year."

The Canucks outshot the Lightning 15-5 in the second and, for the most part, Niittymaki held them at bay, including foiling Alex Burrows on a breakaway.

But with seven seconds left, Kesler received a return pass from Christian Erhoff off a faceoff and counted his 15th goal on a rising screen shot from the top of the circle.

"It was a great screen by Bernier and a great shot by Kesler," Canucks associate coach Rick Bowness said.

St. Louis restored Tampa Bay's lead on an odd-man rush with Stamkos 2:52 into the third period, collecting Kyle Wellwood's blind pass in the neutral zone and curling the puck inside of Erhoff before snapping a shot between Luongo's pads for a gorgeous short-handed tally.

Luongo kept the Canucks within striking distance with a lunging glove save on Vincent Lecavalier — it was upheld by video review — but St. Louis' second goal of the game and 20th overall completed the scoring with 4:20 remaining.

"We have been doing a good job playing with the lead in the third," St. Louis said. "Niitty, obviously, is the backbone of that."

With files from The Canadian Press