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New York Rangers: PK comes up huge in Devils win, other takeaways

By Andrew Steele-Davis

NEWARK, NEW JERSEY - NOVEMBER 30: Ryan Strome #16 of the New York Rangers and P.K. Subban #76 of the New Jersey Devils fight for the puck in the third period at Prudential Center on November 30, 2019 in Newark, New Jersey.The New York Rangers defeated the New Jersey Devils 4-0. (Photo by Elsa/Getty Images)
NEWARK, NEW JERSEY - NOVEMBER 30: Ryan Strome #16 of the New York Rangers and P.K. Subban #76 of the New Jersey Devils fight for the puck in the third period at Prudential Center on November 30, 2019 in Newark, New Jersey.The New York Rangers defeated the New Jersey Devils 4-0. (Photo by Elsa/Getty Images) /
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NEWARK, NJ – NOVEMBER 30: Adam Fox #23 of the New York Rangers is congratulated as he returns to the bench after scoring a power play goal during the first period against the New Jersey Devils on November 30, 2019 at the Prudential Center in Newark, New Jersey. (Photo by Andy Marlin/NHLI via Getty Images)
NEWARK, NJ – NOVEMBER 30: Adam Fox #23 of the New York Rangers is congratulated as he returns to the bench after scoring a power play goal during the first period against the New Jersey Devils on November 30, 2019 at the Prudential Center in Newark, New Jersey. (Photo by Andy Marlin/NHLI via Getty Images) /

1. Rangers do what they had to

There are three key ingredients that go into any team harbouring aspirations of making the playoffs:

  • Win your home games
  • Go .500 on the road
  • Try to fatten up your record by beating up on the bad teams

That’s pretty much what the New York Rangers are doing right now.

They are 8-4-2 at Madison Square Garden, 5-5-1 on the road, 10-4-2 in their last 15 games and they did what they had to by beating up on a poor New Jersey Devils team.

And let’s be frank here. The Devils are a bad hockey team, there is no getting away from it.

They are the Cleveland Browns of the NHL, to be frank. They accumulated a plethora of star power in the off-season, including the No.1 overall pick in the 2019 NHL Entry Draft in Jack Hughes, and they were attracting plenty of hype.

However, and like the Browns, things just haven’t meshed and New Jersey is 9-12-4 with star forward Taylor Hall now on the trade block according to reports.

All of their flaws were on show against the Rangers on Saturday afternoon, and the fact that they went 0-for-8 on the power play with just seven total shots says it all.

But, despite the low quality of the opposition, the Rangers got the job done and that’s exactly what you have to do when you are hoping to make the postseason.

The Blueshirts were hardly at their best, either, and that will happen when you spend a large chunk of the game on the penalty kill.

However, they executed their special teams to perfection and they had that killer instinct to punish the Devils when it really mattered.

If you want to be a playoff team then you have to take advantage of bad teams and grind out wins even when you aren’t at your best, and that’s exactly what the New York Rangers did on Saturday who were playing on tired legs too.

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