Rangers win ugly 3-2 over Kraken

Notes on the game

With the win, the Rangers have a record of 29-13-4 and finished the month of January with a 9-5 record.  The nine wins are the most in any month this season, but they also played 14 games, the most of any month. The Hurricanes won and the Penguins lost so the Rangers are in second place.

The team has had a lot of success playing matinees, winning all four games they have played. They are 3-3 in games nationally televised.

By winning they avoided a three game losing streak. The most they have lost in regulation has been two which has happened twice. They lost three in a row in November, but two of those games were in overtime.

This was the second time this season that they have won by scoring a goal in the last minute of a game. They haven’t lost a game in regulation that way.

Mika Zibanejad is red hot.  He had a goal and two assists and now has 17 goals and 47 points. He is tied for 12th in points in the NHL and he has moved into third place in the NHL in power play goals, five behind Kreider and three behind Draisaitl.    He has 12 goals and 26 points in his last 18 games

Alexis Lafreniere broke a nine game pointless drought with his second period goal.  He has played the last few games on the wing with Zibanejad and Kreider and is looking more comfortable.

The Rangers were outhit 24-23 and have now been outhit in three straight games. At the start of the season it took them 18 games to be outhit three times.

The Rangers allowed the Kraken to hit double figure in shots in all three periods.  That’s the seventh time that has happened this season, and the fifth time in the last 12 games. All last season they allowed more than ten goals in all three periods seven times.

Igor Shesterkin stopped 40 of 42 shots and was rock solid in goal. The McCann goal was the only one that was suspect.<

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Shesterkin is 8-0 lifetime in games he has made 40 or more saves.  He is 9-0 in games when he has faced 40 or more shots.   He has moved back into first place in save percentage (.937) among goalies who have played in 20 or more games.  His 2.10 goals against average is second to Frederik Andersen with 2.02.  He is sixth in wins with 21 despite appearing in fewer games than all the goalies ahead of him.

Shesterkin is wearing a goalie mask with an image of Henrik Lundqvist.

After the game he spoke about how it was playing that one season with him. “I really respected Henrik and just waited for a chance to show myself.”

Jacob Trouba led all Rangers in ice time with 24:58.  K’Andre Miller and Ryan Lindgren were right behind him.

Zac Jones got his first point of the season, assisting on the Lafreniere goal in the second period. He is still looking for his first NHL goal.

The Rangers won 56% of the draws and it paid off on the game winning goal. ZIbanejad won that faceoff en route to way winning 12 of 19 draws while Strome won 12 of 18.

This was the 20th time that the opposition has pulled their goalie.  They’ve scored four times so far this season and the Rangers have scored nine empty net goals. The Rangers have lost only one of the four games when scored upon.

The Rangers record in one goal games is  stellar 17-6-4.   The official number of one goal wins is 14, but they’ve scored empty net goals in games that would have ended up as one goal wins.

The Rangers are 15-1-3 going into the third period with the lead.  Since 2010, they have lost 11 times in regulation in 321 games with a lead to start the last period.

The Rangers are 11-4-2 in games after a loss this season. That’s a big improvement over last season when they were 13-12-2.

Adam Fox made it official. He is not going to the All-Star game and will be replaced by Evgeny Kuznetsov of the Washington Capitals.