With Kevin Hayes out, Rangers start road trip with ugly loss to Avalanche

DENVER — A little less than two hours before facing off against the Colorado Avalanche on Friday night, the Rangers announced via Twitter that they would be without center Kevin Hayes, who they said would be sitting out the game because of an upper-body injury.

Without Hayes, their second-leading scorer, the Rangers started off their three-game western trip with an ugly 6-1 loss to the Avalanche. They were given 10 penalties in the game and allowed three power-play goals by Colorado, which had been winless in its previous six games (0-4-2).

The Rangers spent much of the game shorthanded, having to kill a total of 19 minutes of Colorado power-play time, beginning when Cody McLeod was handed a five-minute major penalty for boarding Colorado defenseman Samuel Girard at 2:29 of the first period. The Avalanche scored two goals on the major power play.

The first, by Nathan MacKinnon, came after Rangers defenseman Adam McQuaid broke his stick. The second occurred when Neal Pionk deflected Mikko Rantanen’s centering pass over the shoulder of goalie Alexandar Georgiev.

“Right from the get-go, we were fighting an uphill battle,’’ Rangers coach David Quinn said. “At the end of the day, we took [10] penalties tonight, and you have zero chance to win a hockey game in that way.

“I’ve never been a part of a game you take [10] penalties and have to kill [19] minutes in penalties in a game.’’

“If they were called, I guess they were penalties,’’ said Vladislav Namestnikov, who was penalized for slashing in the first period and tripping in the second. “It’s hard to dig yourself out of that when you have, I don’t know how many, seven? Seven penalties in the first 27 minutes.’’

It actually was eight penalties, though one of those was Namestnikov’s slash, which was a coincidental minor with Colorado’s Rantanen.

But the thing is, the Rangers (who were outshot 16-3 in the first period, 33-10 after two periods and 47-25 for the game) were down only 2-0 after those 27 minutes.

An even-strength goal by Gabriel Landeskog in the second period pushed the Avalanche lead to 3-0. They scored three more goals in the third, including a second power-play goal by Rantanen.

Ryan Strome scored for the Rangers and Jimmy Vesey had a penalty shot saved by Philipp Grubauer.

Before the game, Quinn was asked if “day-to-day’’ really meant that Hayes might miss only one game.

“I think the altitude and the flying might have had something to do with it,’’ Quinn said. “So this is day-to-day.

“And when we usually say day-to-day, I always mean it,’’ he added with a laugh.

Hayes missed practice Thursday, and the team said it was because of “maintenance.’’ Quinn had said it was because of the injury that caused him to miss several practices last month after a heavy crash into the end boards in a Dec. 14 game against Arizona.

Hayes, 26, had cooled off the last couple of games, but before that, he had put together a nine-game point-scoring streak in which he had five goals and 11 assists. He has 10 goals and 23 assists overall.

Hayes is playing on a one-year, $5.175-million contract he signed last July. By rule, because he signed a one-year deal, the Rangers were not allowed to talk to him about a contract extension until Jan. 1. Hayes’ agent, Bob Murray, said Friday that the Rangers had not yet reached out about a contract.

By Colin Stephenson

colin.stephenson@newsday.comColinSNewsday

Colin Stephenson covers the Rangers for Newsday. He has spent more than two decades covering the NHL and just about every sports team in the New York metropolitan area.