Rangers lose to Flyers 3-2 and it’s time to play the kids

Notes on the game

Despite giving up three goals, Igor Shesterkin kept the Rangers in the game.  He made some absolutely spectacular saves on point blank opportunities.

The Flyers had 36 shots and he stopped 33 of them.

One of Shesterkin’s saves was on a penalty shot by Joel Farabee who had been fouled on a breakaway by Ryan Lindgren.  Shesterkin gave Farabee abosolutely nothing to shoot at and after numerous dekes, Farabee had to settle for a weak backhand.

It was the first penalty shot that Shesterkin has faced in the NHL.

Interesting that Shesterkin has lost the only two shootouts he had played, stopping only three of the six shots.

The Flyers must have something weird with Shesterkin. He has had six games this season when he has faced 36 or more shots.  Four of those games have come against Philadelphia.

The goalie who stole this game was Brian Elliott.  He was lights out in the first period when the Rangers outshot the Flyers 14-11.   He was also helped by the Rangers missing a few open nets, when they could have opened up a two goal lead.

Zac Jones made his debut, playing 9:45 minutes, the fewest of any Ranger defenseman. He did see 1:22 on the power play, second among defensemen to Adam Fox.  His stat line was 3 shots, two blocked shots, one hit, one takeaway and two giveaways.   When asked about him, David Quinn was full of non-specifics.  “I thought he got better and better as the game went on. Not an easy situation to be put in and I think he handled himself well.”

Okay, from this point of view, Jones played well in sheltered minutes.  He had at least a couple opportunities when he could have taken a shot, but deferred and passed the puck.  He was caught once and used his speed to come back and break up the play.  He was victimized on the third Flyers goal by Jakub Voracek.  The Flyer broke out on a two on one with Hajek caught up ice.  Jones looked a little uncertain on coverage and he moved towards the shooter late, a move that might have thrown off Shesterkin.

Quinn was asked about the Lafrenière move to the top line.  Again, more non-specifics. “I thought he made some plays.  I liked his game tonight.”  Let’s just say that Quinn does not have a future as a TV analyst.  In watching Lafrenière, he seemed to do well with Zibanejad and Buchnevich,but was more as a playmaker than a scorer.    He made some solid passes to his linemates and you can only hope that he will get more than one game in that position so he can build up some familiarity with them.

Chris Kreider was fairly ineffective on the third line.   He still played top power play minutes and finished the game with two shots on goal.

The Flyers were 2-6 on the power play and the Flyers’ first goal was an absolute fluke.  It tied the game and changed the momentum.  How fluky was it?  Ivan Provorov took a shot that was going to be three feet wide of the net,but it hit James van Riemsdyk in the jaw and bounced into the net.  The Flyer had to go off for repairs and finished the game with a face mask and a straw to breathe through.

The loss dropped the Rangers record in one goal games to 10-16 (not including empty net goals).

This was the 14th time that the Rangers have pulled their goalie and the first time they have scored.  Unfortunately, this time they trailed by two goals so it wasn’t enough.

The Rangers power play did absolutely nothing in three tries.  Compare the two teams.  The Rangers had 5:25 of time with the man advantage and mustered five shots and two high danger scoring chances.  The Flyers had 7:53 of power play time and had nine shots on goal with seven of the scoring chances being high danger.  Again, when the first unit was not doing anything, Quinn didn’t change a thing.

Perhaps David Quinn could learn a thing or two from Alain Vigneault’s use of Wade Allison. He’s a right winger who was drafted in 2016, but stayed at Western Michigan University for four years, turning pro this season.  After spending most of this season in the AHL he was recently promoted to the big club and has impressed. After playing 11 minutes in his first game, he was rewarded with 16 minutes in his second game and over 13 minutes in the next. In this game he played over 14 minutes including 4:20 on the power play.  Those 14 minutes were substantially more than the minutes played by Lafrenière, Kakko, Chytil, Kravtsov and Howden.  Lafrenière was the only one of the five kids who got a any power play time and it was less the two minutes.  You have to play the kids. You have to put them out in crucial situations or they will never learn.