The New York Rangers had an ideal start to the season, shocking the hockey world after they climbed to second place in the Metropolitan Division. It certainly helped that the Rangers went 6-0-0 at home. Since their sixth home win of the season against the Anaheim Ducks, the Rangers lost their next two games against the Toronto Maple Leafs and Ottawa Senators on the road.
On Monday, the Rangers lost their first home game of the season to the Los Angeles Kings by the score of 6-3. For those curious about how close it really was for the Rangers, the Kings led 5-1 midway through the second period. So yeah, it was not a competitive game.
While the goalie situation is truly a mess for the Rangers and contributed to the loss, there is a common theme for their losses.
Rangers have proven to be unable to come back from early deficits
As Daily Faceoff's Jonny Lazarus points out, the Rangers have gone 0-5-1 when the opposing team scores the first goal of the game. That is not an ideal record to have, especially as this team looks to make it back to the playoffs after missing out the past two campaigns.
Head coach Mike Sullivan how the Rangers are a completely different team when they are trailing early in games. Sullivan says that the team needs to hunker down, especially so they don't give up a second goal early to put the team in a deeper hole.
“I think the biggest thing for me is just — if we give up the first goal, let’s not give up the second one," said Sullivan, h/t Lazarus. "Let’s make sure that we lock down defensively and we bring some energy and we try to get momentum, and I think we’ve given up multiple goals — and that’s a challenge, because now you’re digging out of a hole that’s tough.”
Captain J.T. Miller said that while the team played their brand of hockey later on in the game, they need to make sure they are able to implement their style earlier.
“It shouldn’t matter the score,” Miller said, h/t The Athletic's Vince Mercogliano. “There were spurts of the game tonight where we controlled play, but when you don’t come out ready to play, the reason we’re behind is because we weren’t playing our style. We weren’t playing Rangers hockey.”
Rangers' need to turn the corner soon especially if the plan on making a playoff push
The Rangers can be happy that they got off to such a hot start. It certainly helped that they saw players like Alexis Lafreniere and Gabe Perreault take necessary leaps forward. However, this team could stand to be better.
Pavel Dorofeyev continues to have bad puck luck, as every game it seems as though he misses out on an ideal scoring chance. That's not to say he's not putting in the effort, as he continues to produce high danger scoring chances for the Rangers. One has to wonder if he is able to put this drought behind him, he could be the goal scorer that the Rangers traded two first round picks and committed a seven-year, $77 million contract for.
As for the defense, Sullivan is still tooling around with his core. On Monday night, he moved first-round pick up to pair alongside Sean Durzi, while moving Marcus Pettersson down to third pairing duo with Braden Schneider. It appears that will be something Sullivan continues to experiment with as they enter their lengthy break this week.
Then, there's the goaltending. Garand has held up for the most part, but desperately needed some rest. The Rangers called up James Reimer after he had a shutout performance with the Hartford Wolf Pack. Yet, facing the Kings, Reimer was pulled after allowing three goals on nine shots in the first period. It's evident the Rangers are trying their best to hold on until Joonas Korpisalo returns from his foot infection, which may be in the next two weeks. From there, they will then determine if Korpisalo is good enough to get some starts, or if they'll have to make a trade.
Every team goes through a rough patch. But the fact that this Rangers team can not overcome the odds after giving up the first goal of the game is concerning. Maybe the break will help them, and they can put that issue behind them.
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