The New York Rangers have made a lot of progress this season. They have improved their defense beyond expectations and this game was perfect example. Nursing a slim one goal lead, they absolutely shut down the Washington Capitals, the top offensive team in the East, for 55 minutes but then gave up two quick goals to Alex Ovechkin and lost 2-1.
The Rangers held the Caps to only 18 shots on goal. With less than five minutes left in the game, Washington had one shot on goal, but they scored on the next two shots and of course, it was Ovechkin, one of the greatest goal scorers in NHL history. The goals were practically identical, as they both came off shots that ended up bouncing right to the Russian who just had to put them into the open net.
The Rangers deserve a lot of credit for keeping shots away from their net, but shots on goal is a deceptive number. Overall, the Rangers finished with 22 scoring chances at even strength versus 20 for the Capitals. The Caps had seven high danger scoring changes compared to five for the Rangers. Shot attempts for the two teams was practically identical. The Rangers blockedd 16 shots compared to nine for Washington.
After the game, the talk was about the positives with Jacob Trouba the most optimistic. He said “We had some breakdowns, overall we liked the way we played for the most part, we had a couple rebounds in front the last give minutes, it’s tough to lose that way, I don’t think we’re looking at it that way, we’re looking that we played pretty well for 55 minutes.”
Chris Kreider was less satisfied. “It’s tough to stomach, cause we felt like we played pretty well. Definitely a lot of good takeaways. It’s disappointing, but we have to bounce back and play the same way tomorrow. ”
A fatal flaw
The reason the Capitals won is because they never stopped taking shots and crashing the net. While the Rangers did a great blocking shots and keeping them away from Georgiev, eventually two got through to the chaos in front of the net and Ovechkin was there to slam the puck home. Twice.
Kreider spoke about that. ‘It was kind of like deja vu on that second goal. Pretty identical. Pucks and bodies to the net, that’s a recipe for scoring goals, something we could’ve done a little bit more of tonight,…I thought we did a pretty good job. We have to continue to try to get there, get pucks there, and make it hard on their goaltender like they did on ours. ”
And that is the frustration for Ranger fans. While Ovechkin is famous for his wicked one timers he is just as effective going to the net and using his big body to get to rebounds. It’s a weakness for this Rangers team.
The Rangers had two chances to put the game away on two third period power plays and they got only three shots on goal, all stopped by Vitek Vanecek. No one went to the front of the net and caused any havoc in front of Vanecek. They keep looking for the perfect pass and shot and that’s why it took 1:20 to even get a shot attempt on their second man advantage. And 32 seconds after that power play ended, the Capitals tied the game.
The bottom line is despite all of the great defensive work, the Rangers still blew a third period lead and lost a crucial two points, slipping further behind in the playoff race as the clock keeps ticking.
Here is a full video recap of the game.