December 14, 2020: This day in New York Rangers history

Twin city for the New York Rangers

What happened on December 14 in the history of the New York Rangers

On this date in 2006, twins Henrik and Joel Lundqvist played against each other for the first time in the NHL.  It was a better game for Henrik as the Rangers won 5-2 against the Stars in Dallas.   Henrik was named the first star of the game based on his 43 save performance.

The Rangers were shorthanded 11 times in this game including five times in the first period. It was a nasty game with one fight and six minor penalties for slashing, roughing or boarding.

Joel didn’t play much, only 5:44 and didn’t see any power play time. He had no shots on goal against his brother.  The twins faced each other two more times in the NHL with Dallas winning both other games, but Joel never got a shot on goal against Henrik.

This was the third time that twins had played in a game for the Rangers. Peter Sundstrom was a Ranger and his brother Patrik played against him when he was with Vancouver in the early 1980s.

The only pair of twins that played as teammates for the Blueshirts were Peter and Chris Ferraro in 1995-96.  They were the second pair to do it in the NHL, preceded only by Rich and Ron Sutter who played together for the Flyers in 1983.   The most productive twins were the Sedins who starred for years in Vancouver.

As for the Lundqvists, they have played together for Frölunda in the SHL and for Team Sweden in international competition.

A first for who?

On this date in 1930, the Detroit Falcons played their first game at Madison Square Garden.  The Rangers won 3-0 behind the goaltending of John Ross Roach.

The Detroit Cougars had changed their name to the Falcons.  As the Cougars, the team had made the playoffs once in four years and had yet to win a playoff game so they felt a new name might bring new luck.    They lasted as the Falcons for two season before the team was purchased by James Norris (of Norris Trophy fame) and he immediately renamed them the Red Wings.

Today’s birthday

December 14 is the birthday of Hall of Famer William Jennings, born in New York City in 1920.  A lawyer by trade, he first served as counsel for Madison Square Garden and was eventually named President of the Rangers in 1962.   He served in that role until his death in 1981 at age 60. .

In that role he was influential in the growth of the sport and was a driving force  behind expansion. He created the Lester Patrick Award, an honor he won himself in 1971.  After he passed away, the NHL created the William Jennings Trophy, awarded to the goaltenders on the team that allows the fewest goals.  That allowed the Vezina Trophy to go to the best goalie as voted by NHL general managers.

Jennings was inducted into the Hall of Fame as a builder in 1975.

The numbers

The Rangers have played 39 games on December 14 in their history and they are sitting at .500 on the day getting exactly half the points that they could have earned.

Games: 39
Regulation wins: 14
Regulation losses: 14
Ties: 8
Overtime losses: 2
Shootout losses: 1
Points percentage: .500

Looking back

On each day, we look back at what the Rangers did one, five and ten years ago. The only time they played was last season and it was a blown lead resulting in a shootout loss.

Last season – 2019:  Anaheim 4, Rangers 3 (Shootout)

The Rangers blew two leads and lost in a shootout when Jakob Silverberg scored in the fourth round of the shootout after John  Gibson made the save on Kaapo Kakko. It was another one of those games that saw the Rangers allowing a costly late goal.  Hampus Lindhom scored his first goal of the season with just under two minutes left in the game.  It dropped the Rangers record to 16-12-4.

5 years ago – 2015: No game

10 years ago – 2010: No game