New York Rangers vs New York Islanders: A 6-2 thrashing of their rivals

The game

The game got off to a disastrous start as yet again, the Rangers gave up an early goal.  This one was 18 seconds into the game and came off a comedy of errors in the defensive zone. Jacob Trouba was pressured and the Blueshirts were taking off on offense before the puck was cleared.  Jordan Eberle got the puck and was able to hold it until Georgiev was out of position and he scored into an empty net.

Less than two minutes later, Micheal Haley took on Ross Johnston, one of the toughest players in the league.  Johnston rained punched on Haley’s helmet before the Ranger counterpunched and caught Johnston with a couple rights.

Before the puck was dropped Brendan Smith and Matt Martin took each other on.  Both players were tossed for fighting within the same play stoppage.  They thought they had waited until the puck had been dropped, but it was a false start and the penalty for that is an automatic game misconduct.

Down 1-0 and reeling, the fights gave the Blueshirts a chance to regain their composure and Jesper Fast knotted the score at 8:14.

It came after a great forechecking shift for the Rangers and Fast scored while diving for the puck off the rebound of an Artemi Panarin shot.  The Islanders argued that Fast should have been called for slashing, but the goal stood.  On replay, they had a decent argument.

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The Rangers dominated the first period, outshooting the Islanders 17-7, but it ended with the score knotted at 1-1.  The Rangers had the only power play opportunity when Mathew Barzal was called for tripping Marc Staal, but that was unsuccessful.

In the second period, the  Rangers picked up where they left off and repeatedly had opportunities to score, but couldn’t cash in . Five minutes into the period, Chris Kreider did precisely that with a marvelous tip in of another Panarin shot.

The goal was reviewed as Kreider had deflected it dangerously close to the height of the crossbar, but since there wasn’t enough evidence to overturn it, it was ruled a goal and the Rangers had the lead.

They padded that lead when Adam Fox scored an absolutely brilliant goal at the 11:11 mark.

Under pressure, Fox carried the puck past the right faceoff circle and put the shot between Semyon Varlamov and the post.  He had the tiniest space for the shot and he found it. With this goal, Panarin notched his third point of the game, the fourth straight home game he has done that.

With the dreaded two goal lead in hand, the Islanders mounted a spirited comeback and poured a number of shots on Georgiev, who had not had a lot of work for the first half of the game. The Islanders actually outshot the Rangers 16-8 in the second period.   They had  the last eight shots of the period including  flurry of shots with about two minutes left in the period.

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The Rangers proved to be agile counter punchers when Artemi Panarin scored on a breakaway in the first minutes of the third period.

With the puck in the Rangers’ zone, a pass ticked off Michael Del Colle’s skate right to Panarin who went in all along on Varlamov and he put the puck over his shoulder with a backhand.

Eight minutes later, Panarin did it again.

Jesper Fast made the play, stealing it along the boards and sending it to Ryan  Strome who broke in on a two-on-one with Panarin.  He made the pass and Panarin puck through Varlamov.  It was Panarin’s fifth point of the night, tying a career high.

The Rangers closed out the scoring on the power play when Jacob Trouba scored.

It was a one-timer from the point off a faceoff win by Filip Chytil and a pass from Adam Fox.  The sixth goal was enough t o send Varlamov to an early shower as Thomas Greiss came in to relieve him at the 10:15 mark.

Twelve minutes into the third period, Marc Staal took a tripping penalty and Brock Nelson was able to score on the subsequent power play.

The action wasn’t over. With a little over five minutes left in the game, Mika Zibanejad was leveled by a Brock Nelson hit and immediately he was challenged by Chris Kreider and Anthony DeAngelo.  There was actually a fight between Ross Johnston and DeAngelo, but it was a total mismatch. Johnston has a six inch height advantage and a 55 pound weight advantage.  Kreider and DeAngelo both ended up with ten minute misconducts along with Johnston.  The Isles ended up with the power play, but couldn’t score and the game ended up fairly quietly three minutes later.