New York Rangers come up short in a 5-2 loss to the Capitals

The losing streak is now three games for the New York Rangers.  For the second game in a row, the Rangers played a good road game, but came up short. For the second straight game, special teams let the team down.

The troubles continued for the New York Rangers as they traveled to Washington to face the defending Metropolitan Division champions.   The Blueshirts played a tough, physical game, but couldn’t match the Capitals.

The Rangers were one for four on the power play, but the Capitals scored twice on four man advantages and that was the difference.  For the second consecutive game, the Rangers had power play opportunities in the third period, but couldn’t score.

For the the second game in a row the Rangers felt victimized by a bad call that cost them dearly. Last game it was the lack of a major penalty, this time it was a Brendan Smith crosscheck.

Henrik Lundqvist did his best to keep the Rangers in the game, allowing only two even strength goals and making 29 saves, many of them difficult.

The Rangers have stopped scoring with only five goals in their last three games.  Their need for more secondary scoring is becoming dire.  ZIbanejad and Panarin have accounted for seven of the 15 goals the Rangers have scored this season.  That’s too much.

There were lineup changes for the Rangers as Chris Kreider found himself on the right side for one of the first times in his career, playing on the top line with Mika Zibanejad and Artemi Panarin.  In the other change, Brendan Lemieux was back in the lineup on the fourth line, replacing Greg McKegg.

The game

The Rangers controlled play for most of the first period , but it was Washington that scored first and of course, it was on the power play as the Rangers took another early penalty.  It was just 1:09 into the game when T.J. Oshie broke in and was fouled by Artemi Panarin. It was Oshie who scored the power play goal at 2:24 when the puck banked in off Marc Staal’s skate after Henrik Lundqivst had made a number of saves as Oshie whacked at the puck.

The Rangers got on the scoreboard at 12:25 on the powerplay.  Niklas Backstrom took a tripping penalty in the offensive zone and on the Rangers’ second rush Mika Zibanejad made a brilliant pass to Pavel Buchnevich who was trailing the play and who had a wide open net as Braden Holtby committed way too early.

The tie disappeared three minutes later when Michal Kempny trailed the play as the Caps swarmed in the Ranger zone and he had an open net for the goal.

it wasn’t a bad period for the Blueshirts as they controlled play for much of the period and outshot the Capitals 12-9.

It was a completely different story in the second period and the Rangers were lucky to escape down only one goal.   The Capitals scored early on a goal by Nic Dowd.  John Carlson got his second assist and moved into second place in NHL scoring. With the Rangers’ top line on the ice,  Dmitry Orlov hit the post the rebound went right to Dowd who had an open net.

The Caps were all over the Rangers and it was Henrik Lundqvist who kept them in the game.  At 10:16 Jakub Vrana had a breakaway and what looked like a good stick check by Brady Skjei was called a penalty and he was awarded a penalty shot.   Vrana took the shot, but was stoned by Lundqvist who made a pad save.

It took 11:03 for the Rangers to finally get a shot on goal on a rush led by Buchnevich right after a massive hit by Jacob Trouba.   It was a crazy flurry with the Rangers getting four shots on goal, all saved by Holtby.

The Rangers started to take over the game and finally broke through and it was Artemi Panarin who scored with just over three minutes left in the period.

Libor Hajek did the work keeping the puck in the zone and got the puck to Zibanejad who made the pass to Panarin who executed a perfect give and go with Kreider.  The period ended

The Rangers were outshot 16-7, but the period ended with them down only 3-2 and still in the game thanks to Lundqvist.

The major bugaboo this season came back to haunt the Blueshirts in the third period.  Brendan Smith checked Garnet Hathaway and they exchanged punches, but Smith got the extra two minutes for cross checking and the Capitals made the Rangers pay. It was T.J. Oshie with his second power play goal, deflecting a point shot from John Carlson.  The Rangers need to kill those penalties, but the cross check was a very marginal call.

From that point, the Rangers threw some shots at Holtby, but they couldn’t break through and came up empty on one last power play and Hathaway sealed the deal with an empty net goal.

Notes on the game

David Quinn had a pretty harsh assessment of the Rangers’ defense. “From my end it was just how bad we were defensively.  The glaring chances we gave up, the turnovers, the lack of  urgency in the D zone. That’s where it all started.”  He added “there was a lot of purposeless hockey today.”

Putting Kreider on the top line on the right wing was intended to jump start his game.  It had more of an effect on Pavel Buchnevich who moved to the second line playing on the left wing.  Kreider did get an assist on the Panarin goal in the second period.

Jacob  Trouba’s bodychecking is underestimated.  In the second period, he laid out Garnet Hathaway with an open ice hit that rocked the Capital, sending him to the lockerroom.  Trouba played 28:22, more minutes than any Ranger in the last two years.

The Jakub Vrana penalty shot was the 23rd of Henrik Lundqvist’s career.  He has stopped 14 and allowed nine goals. Two of those stops came in the Stanley Cup Playoffs in 2008 against the Evgeni Malkin of the Penguins and John Madden of the Devils.

Back from his trip to the Quinn Bin, Lemieux played a solid game.  He threw some heavy checks and got into a wrestling match with Radko Gudas.   It was the first fighting major of the season for the Blueshirts.  He drew a penalty in the second period.

Anthony DeAngelo found himself riding the bench, playing only 8:09, even less than Micheal Haley.   After the game Quinn called it a “coach’s decision.”

Here’s the marginal crosschecking call on Brendan Smith.  You look at it and what do you think?

Speaking of Haley, he hasn’t embarrassed himself on the ice. He takes the body and made some decent plays on the fourth line.  The question is whether the team could do better.

The Rangers won the majority of the faceoffs, with Howden leading the way at 7-4.

The Capitals are a “heavy” team, but the Blueshirts matched them hit for hit.  The Caps ended up with 22 hits to the Rangers’ 19.

After no fights in the first four games, the Ranters got into two fights against the Capitals.  Probably the biggest surprise is that it was not Micheal Haley