New York Rangers vs Islanders: A huge last minute 3-2 win

Round two of this three game bout between the New York Rangers and Islanders ended with the Blueshirts victorious.  They scored the winning goal with 25 seconds left and have clinched this series.

The New York Rangers posted a 3-2 win at the Nassau Coliseum that has to be the best “feel good” game of the season.   It was a wild affair with periods of total domination by both teams, lost leads and outstanding special teams play.  Goats became heroes and the Rangers won it on a Chris Kreider power play goal with 25 seconds left.

You can sense a change in this team going back to the  loss in Calgary.  The forecheck is better, defensive play has solidified and as usual, the goaltending has been stellar.  There is a resilience and determination in this team that wasn’t present earlier in the season.  It may be too late to salvage this season, but they are definitely building for the future.

David Quinn said it best, calling it a “ballsy effort.” He talked about the progress the team has made.  “When you come in here against a team that has the success they’ve had, they test your mettle, they test your mental toughness, they test your physical toughness and to come in here and get two points, it certainly is a great sign of the growth. ” He added, “We do look different.”

It was a complete team effort against an Islander team that was much much better than the team they played on Monday.  Special teams told the story as the Rangers killed all five Islander power plays and scored twice on their five man-advantages.

This was as big a character win for this young Rangers team as any this season and they head into two more key Metropolitan Division matches with Columbus and the Islanders before the All-Star break.

The game

This was a wild game and the first period started out as expected, with the Islanders charging hard.  They outshot the Rangers 22-6 and at times were dominant.    It was the Alexandar Georgiev show as he stood tall.

There were several awful miscues in the defensive zone, one by Tony DeAngelo and another by Jacob Trouba, but their goalie bailed them out.

Each team had one power play, but neither team could score and it looked like the Rangers would escape the first period without trailing.  Of course, that was not to be as the Islanders scored with 51 second left in the period.  A Jacob Trouba giveaway let to the goal as the fourth line was caught up ice and didn’t get back in time to catch Josh Bailey, the trailing forward who took the pass from Ross Johnston and was all alone in front of Georgiev.   Bailey didn’t miss and the Rangers went into the locker room trailing 1-0.

The second period was a completely different story.  The Rangers were totally dominant taking the first 12 shots of the period.   The Islanders didn’t get their first shot until Brock Nelson had a shot on goal at 14:16.   Despite the dominating play, it was Semyon Varlamov‘s turn to excel and the Rangers couldn’t score, then at 12:46 the Rangers got on board with a power play goal that had to be reviewed to count.  During a chaotic sequence in front of the Islanders net, Mika ZIbanejad swiped at a rebound of a DeAngelo shot. It looked like the puck had crossed the goal line, but Ryan Pulock batted the puck out of the net and the referee waved it off..

After about a minute of play, there was a stoppage and it was reviewed.

The goal was announced and it was a new game, tied 1-1 with just over a 25 minutes left in the game. Of course, Adam Fox took a penalty for tripping Mathew Barzal, an awful call as he just fell down.  The Blueshirts withstood the power play , but play definitely changed in favor of the Islanders from that point.

The Islanders had the last five shots of the period and again, it was Georgiev who kept the Rangers in the game.  The second period ended with the score knotted 1-1.  That set the stage for a wild final stanza.

Anthony DeAngelo went from goat to hero in two minutes.  Two minutes into the period, DeAngelo blew his cool when Brock Nelson knocked the stick out of his hands and he ended up interfering with Anders Lee. It was the third straight call against he Rangers and the feeling was that the Isles would break through.

The penalty killers stood tall and when the penalty ended, DeAngelo got to the puck and had a clean break .

it was Ryan Lindgren with the shot block who cleared the puck to center ice where DeAngelo took over.

The final ten minutes was dominated by a series of iffy calls by the referees.  It started when Casey Cizikas hooked Artemi Panarin as he broke towards the net. It was definitely a penalty, but then the refs penalized Panarin for embellishment, a lousy call.  Anyone who watches Panarin play knows he doesn’t dive and he didn’t in this case.  It was really painful when the Islanders scored 11 seconds later on the four on four when Anthony Beauvillier scored off a bad bounce off the boards.

Georgiev fanned on the puck when he tried to direct it into the corner and nobody picked up Cizikas streaking into the slot.  So, tie score with seven minutes left.

Things really looked bad when Krieder was called for interference when he ran into the goaltender on a rush. Kreider was bumped and it was unclear if he really tried to avoid contact.  At any rate, Kreider was in the box for the Islanders fifth power play with six minutes left.

The penalty kill held fast and it was the Rangers turn for a power play on another iffy call.  This time it was Derick Brassard who was called for cross checking Jesper Fast into the board.  Fast sold it well and it was yet another soft call.

Kreider was the next Ranger to go from goat to hero when he slammed home the rebound of a Zibanejad shot from the slot for the game winning power play goal with 25 seconds left.

It was Artemi Panarin who set up Zibanejad for the shot that led to the rebound that Kreider put home.

It was clearly a shocking ending for the Islanders who have made it a habit of coming back in games all season.  The victory leaves the Rangers with 50 points, only six points behind the final wild card team, Columbus.  Guess who they play on Sunday?

Notes on the game

This win was the Rangers first at Nassau Coliseum since March 10, 2015. That game was a 2-1 win for the Blueshirts.

The Rangers have now won four out of their last five games. The win ended a four game road losing streak.

The Rangers have now won 10 of 13 games against Metropolitan Division rivals including 10 of their last 11.  With 20 of a possible 26 points, this record is making their playoffs hopes possible.

Alexandar Georgiev now has a career 4-1 record against the Islanders.  He has allowed six goals on 134 shots, a .956 save percentage. He has won every start he has made against the Islanders. His one loss came when he relieved

Henrik Lundqvist

in a 7-5 loss and allowed the six goal that ended up being the game winner and saddled him with the loss.  The seventh goal that game was an empty net goal, so in his only loss, he allowed one goal.

The power play assist for Zibanejad on the game winning goal was only his second PP assist since October 18.  He leads the team with seven power play goals.

The Isles led in practically every single category.  They outshot (40-28) and outhit (38-30) the Rangers. They won 60% of the faceoffs and had more blocked shots (15-14) and takeaways (10-8) than the Rangers.

The key questions are which goalie will get the start on Sunday versus Columbus and will Georgiev get the third start against the Islanders on Tuesday?  Based on the last two games, he certainly deserves it.