Rangers vs. Sabres: Are we desperate yet?
By Steve Paulus
The New York Rangers finish their two games series with the Buffalo Sabres after a desultory effort on Tuesday that didn’t reflect the final score. Although only six games into the new season and despite the fact that the Rangers have been in five of those six games, this campaign is teetering on the brink of a disaster.
Credit inflated expectations for most of the angst associated with this bad start, but the last game was a reason to set off alarms. Coming off a tough series in Pittsburgh, the Rangers completely collapsed in the second period of Tuesday’s game when they gave up the tying goal, a shorthanded tally by Tobias Rieder. That’s right, the tying goal.
What’s not working? An awful lot. The team cannot hold a lead. They are taking lazy and dumb penalties. Scorers are not scoring. Veterans are not leading. Special teams are in disarray. Forward lines are a guessing game. The third defense pair is a mess. Goaltending has been sub-par. They cannot win a faceoff.
What’s working? The kids, most notably Adam Fox, K’Andre Miller, Kaapo Kakko, Alexis Lafrenière Filip Chytil and Ryan Lindgren. Pavel Buchnevich is the best forward on the team. Jacob Trouba has found a partner and his game has benefited. High energy depth players like Phil Di Giuseppe and Colin Blackwell have stepped up.
The good news is the Rangers could be very close to turning it around. True, they’ve had two stinkers in six games, but they could have won five of those games. A 3-1-1 record in those five games and they would be two points out of a playoff spot.
The new divisional format is a double edged sword. Losses are incredibly damaging, but teams can recover quickly and that is the Rangers’ best hope. What they need to do is stop the bleeding and they can go a long way towards doing that with a good effort against the Sabres.