Rangers revisited: An overtime win over Tampa

Three years ago, the New York Rangers upset the Tampa Bay Lightning on the road with a dramatic overtime win

With no New York Rangers hockey until January, we will try to give all Ranger fans a taste of hockey by reliving the best moments of the last five years on this date.

For November 2 we will travel back to 2017 and if you watch the clips, it’s definitely a weird experience.  Ryan McDonagh, Kevin Shattenkirk and J.T. Miller are all Rangers while Vlad Namestnikov and Dan Girardi are with Tampa.  Little did we know that in less than four months, three of those players would be exchanging uniforms. Although it was only three years ago, it feels like many more.

November 2, 2017 was a Thursday night as the Rangers made their annual road trip to Florida to take on the Lightning and the Panthers.   In the first game of the trip, the Blueshirts upset Tampa with a 2-1 win as J.T Miller scored 1:19 into overtime.  For the Rangers, it was their fifth win of the season in 14 games (5-7-2).   For Tampa, it was only their second loss of the season giving them a 10-2-2 record.

The Rangers jumped out to a 1-0 lead on a Chris Kreider goal.   He scored on a three on one break in on a feed from Mika Zibanejad.

The Rangers dominated the game, peppering  Andrei Vasilevskiy with 35 shots including this save off his mask on a Brady Skjei shot.

The Rangers held their lead until 11 minutes of the second period when Yanni Gourde scored a shorthanded goal.

The game wasn’t without controversy when an apparent Tampa go ahead goal in the third period was disallowed.  Alex Killorn scored at 2:59 of the period, but it was waved off because the referees felt that Gabriel Dumont had made incidental contact with goalie Henrik Lundqvist before the puck cross the goal line.  Tampa coach Jon Cooper challenged the call and it went to video review, but the score remained tied 1-1.

After the game, Cooper complained “You can tell by a goalie’s reaction if he thinks it’s goalie interference, [Lundqvist] didn’t even react one ounce, you’re allowed to be in the blue paint. Forwards are allowed to go there. It did not impede his ability to make the save.”

Lundqvist had this explanation: “Well, I want to come out, I can’t come out, I can’t play the position, so I think it was absolutely the right call. Sometimes I think players think they have to bump the goalie. But he comes in there, I can’t come out, and they shoot. So I think it’s the right call.”

The game went to overtime and that’s when J.T. Miller took over.

It was a brilliant move as Miller beat Gourde and Brayden Point, cut to the net and put the puck past Vasilevskiy.  While Miller could be a frustrating player, it was a goal like this that made it obvious why the Lightning insisted on him being included in the big trade at the deadline.

If you want expanded highlights of the game, here they are:

The disputed goal by Killorn is three minutes into the highlights clip.

Lundqvist made 27 saves for the win as he faced former teammate Dan Girardi for the first time.  Girardi had one hit, one takeaway and one blocked shot in his first game against New York since being bought out by the Blueshirts and signing with Tampa.