TAMPA, Fla. -- As far as elixirs go, the New York Rangers came up with quite the potion Friday night to cure much of what had been ailing them.

Rick Nash scored twice and was dominant. Martin St. Louis potted his first goal of the playoffs. Tampa's Triplets were tamed. And Henrik Lundqvist was back to being his Vezina self.

All in a night's work, right?

"Well, I think it's important you realize in the big moments that we all have to step up, not only your top players," Lundqvist after his team's 5-1 win in Game 4 over the Tampa Bay Lightning evened the Eastern Conference finals at two games apiece. "I felt like the entire team stepped up tonight. There were times, especially in the second, where they came really hard. But we weathered the storm, and we answered back with some huge goals.

"It still feels so good when you feel like you're doing it together. ... We knew the importance of this game. Going home 3-1 against this team would have been extremely tough, so our goal was just to get this one."

The day began with a confident-sounding Lundqvist holding court with the media after the morning skate and, like the leader his is, essentially saying that he would bounce back after giving up 12 goals in the previous two games combined.

I guess 38 saves on 39 shots is a bounce-back, alright.

"Well, I think there was a lot of talk about him and about his play, but there wasn't any doubt from within our dressing room," Rangers coach Alain Vigneault said. "Hank has done this so many times before, that we knew he was going to come out and do what he always does, which is give us a chance to win, and that's what he did again tonight."

Let's not kid ourselves here, Tampa Bay makes this a totally different game if the Lightning convert on only two or three of their long list of chances in a second period, which saw them outshoot the Rangers 19-6. But aside from Steven Stamkos' one-time blast, Lundqvist stood tall to make sure this one wouldn't get away from the Blueshirts in what felt like a must-win.

"In the second period, we lost a little bit of the momentum," Vigneault said. "We took a couple early penalties. They had some real good looks and that's where our goaltender stood up and made a stand, kept us in the game."

With Lundqvist providing the wall in net, it allowed his teammates to forge ahead. Chris Kreider and Keith Yandle scored less than two minutes apart late in the middle period, and the 3-1 lead would be safe on this night. It was a strong response from a veteran team after playing the period on its heels.

Vigneault was much happier with the first period. Nash set the tone with the game's opening goal at 17:18, driving hard to the net the way he does when he's playing well.

"I've been trying to make that a priority in the game," said the 6-foot-4, 220-pound Nash. "I was trying to bring it to the net a bit more tonight."

He capped the night's scoring on the power play at 11:33 of the third period, jamming home a loose puck for his first two-goal playoff game of his NHL career.

It felt mighty good for a player who has taken a lot of heat the last two playoff years.

"It's frustrating when you feel like you're letting the team down and you're struggling," Nash said. "You feel it. I'm trying to do everything I can offensively, and tonight I got some bounces and they went in."

Nash hadn't registered a point of any kind since Game 6 at the Washington Capitals in the second round.

"You always feel pressure to produce offensively," the 30-year-old star said. "And it's disappointing and frustrating when you can't help out the team like you're supposed to."

But it could be argued no one seemed more relieved on this night than a 39-year-old winger who had gone 18 straight games without a goal.

The expression on St. Louis' face after one-timing a cross-ice pass from Derick Brassard on a power play in the back of the net said it all.

"The games keep piling on (without scoring), you're getting chances, of course you press," said St. Louis, rubbing his gray beard after the game. "Any guy that tells you they don't press, they're lying. You're squeezing the stick a little bit. But you got to play the game. You can't just try to get goals. You got to play the game 200 feet. You do that, sometimes you get rewarded. And tonight I did."

His power-play goal was one of two on the night for the Rangers, who have now gone 6-for-13 with the man advantage over the past three games. No small achievement when you consider how the Blueshirts have been torched by Tampa's power play at times in this series. The Rangers are fighting fire with fire now.

"Guys are making good reads, good decisions," St. Louis said of the power-play success of late. "Sometimes you're winning more faceoffs, you're more efficient. And we're making plays. Special teams are always big at this time of the year and it's nice to get our power play to be rolling. Whether you get back in the game or separate yourself a bit, there are key times in the game when you need the power play to be going."

It wasn't a defensive masterpiece by the Rangers, Lundqvist masked some of the breakdowns on this night, but New York certainly did a better job containing the Triplets, as Tyler Johnson, Nikita Kucherov and Ondrej Palat were held to one shot on goal apiece.

"I think a big part of it was shutting down their top two lines," Nash said. "Those guys are pretty impressive, those top-six forwards. To minimize our turnovers in the neutral zone and not allow them to come at us with speed."

What this feels like now is a series going seven games as two very evenly matched clubs are going punch, counterpunch.

"We look at it this way, it's the best-of-three to get to the Stanley Cup," Tampa Bay's Johnson said. "That's pretty cool."

And hey, the hockey has been entertaining, too.