It wasn’t the nail in the coffin for the New York Rangers’ playoff hopes, but they are getting close to the point of no return. The three teams that they have to pass all came away with points with the Bruins and Penguins winning and the Flyers salvaging a point in a shootout. With only 17 games left in the season, the Rangers have to go on a fantastic run while their competitors have to collapse and the bottom line is that will not happen. Oh well, it was fun while it lasted.
The key is what happens the next two games. The Rangers take on a first place Islanders team that has lost only once at the Nassau Coliseum. Staring at a potential lost weekend on Long Island and the trade deadline on Monday, we could be seeing some roster moves by Monday.
After being embarrassed on Tuesday night, everyone knew that the Penguins would come out flying and they did, outshooting the Rangers 10-2 in the first six minutes of the game, culminating in the first Penguins goal.
It all went downhill from there, aided by Mika Zibanejad and Filip Chytil missing wide open nets at absolutely crucial moments in the game and Chris Kreider getting stopped on a penalty shot.
While ZIbanejad’s miss came when the Rangers were shorthanded, his line has just been not performing at even strength. The numbers are ugly. Zibanejad has two even strength goals in his last nine games and has no assists in seven games. Pavel Buchnevich has one even strength goal in his last seven games and one assist in his last eight. Chris Kreider has one even strength goal in his last 18 games and one assist in 11 games. Those are not top line numbers.
After the game Zibanejad said that the team was “stubborn” in the way that they played. He was right. The Ranger kept trying to make plays to get into the Penguins zone and were stymied repeatedly in the neutral zone when just throwing the puck into the zone and chasing it would have been better. Every line was guilty of it, probably a result of their success on Tuesday. The Penguins were having none of that in this game.
The question is how they could play like this for three periods. When it wasn’t working for two periods, there was only one way to play and the Rangers just didn’t do it.
When they play this way, it raises questions about coaching and leadership. It’s easy for Zibanejad and David Quinn to talk about it, but there has to be execution.
As Quinn put it “Sometimes when you win a game 8-3, you change your mindset a little bit, you do that at this level you’re gonna get what you deserve. We’ve got to find that balance of being effective offensively and playing the right way. That’s the balancing act we’re always battling and it bit us in the ass tonight.”
Still, it can be seen as a question of preparation. Quinn said “I knew what was in store for us tonight and we weren’t able to be consistent enough throughout the game.” Consistent is not the word to describe this game, it was much more being effective.
Not to put this all on the coaches, on a team with most players under the age of 25, it has to be up to the leadership to do the right thing, not just talk about it.
The problem is that on this team they don’t have the leadership to do the right thing and get the entire squad on the same wavelength.
Here are the video highlights from the game.