The New York Rangers endured a rough stretch before their win over the St. Louis Blues on Tuesday, and carried a three-game winning streak entering Monday night. The Rangers had a chance at redemption against the Edmonton Oilers, who defeated them handedly over a week ago. Not only that, but it would allow them to pull further away from the pack in the Metropolitan Division and catch up with the New Jersey Devils on
New York did not accomplish that, as they lost 3-1 to the Oilers. In not surprising news, the Rangers allowed two goals to Leon Draisaitl and one to Connor McDavid. Yet, this was actually a winnable game for the Rangers.
Rangers squandered a perfect chance to score upset win over Oilers
The Oilers were among one of the top scoring teams in the NHL, and making any sort of mistake would have cost the Rangers dearly in the game. But for New York, they more than held their own defensively. That's because the Rangers held the Oilers to just 20 shots on goal, which is insane to think about given the presences of McDavid and Draisaitl.
But there is one statistic that may be more impressive. According to Natural Stat Trick, h/t The Athletic's Vince Mercogliano, the Oilers only had two high danger scoring chances the entire game, which is incredible if you look at it from the Rangers' perspective. They ensured starting goaltender Dylan Garand wasn't in total danger throughout the game.
Yet, the story of the game will be the Rangers didn't make the most of their chances. They had six high danger scoring chances in the entire game. Yet, they didn't pick up a goal on either of those chances. 31 total shots on goal, and just one goal to show for it.
It is a bit inexcusable, as this was a game the Rangers should have won. Team captain J.T. Miller said just that after the game.
“I think we outplayed them today,” said Miller, h/t Mercogliano “I thought we deserved a better fate. Their goalie (Devon Levi) played outstanding. I thought everybody, to a man, played hard. We’re blocking shots, defending hard. I thought we did a good job against their star players. It just wasn’t our night, unfortunately.”
Rangers' lack of scoring doomed them against Oilers
As mentioned earlier, the Rangers were able to put goalie Devon Levi in a bit of distress with the amount of shots they were able to unleash. Yet, there was more reason for the Rangers to be discouraged.
The Rangers had five power play opportunities the entire game, yet were unable to score a goal. Talk about wasted opportunities. Head coach Mike Sullivan felt that their entries into Edmonton's territory sunk any chance they had of scoring goals on the power play.
"We had our opportunities. I thought there were moments when we were executing. I thought the biggest challenge for our power plays tonight were the entries," said Sullivan, h/t Mercogliano. "I thought we lacked some speed. They did a pretty good job at making the stand at the line, but I think we've got to be willing to put pucks behind them when there's no room on the entry and we don't have speed. I thought we could have done a better job generating more speed through the neutral zone. That could have helped us on the entries, but we had you know three or four grade-A looks. We don't score. It was one of those nights.”
The inefficiency of the power play has been a theme for the Rangers this season. Hence why Sullivan is constantly tooling with the lineups when they have the extra skater advantage. After this game, the Ranger's power play unit ranks 24th in the NHL with just an 18.9 percent success rate.
The good thing for the Rangers is that there is still plenty of season to go, where they can hopefully find a solution to their power play woes. If they are able to find the right combination with the big name getting hot at the right time, it should get going, and the success rate should increase. But for now, they will have to lament a win that got away from them in Edmonton.
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