Rangers rebound with shootout win against Jackets

COLUMBUS, Ohio — OK, so maybe the Rangers haven’t quite figured out 100 percent how to shut teams down and close games out when they have a lead. But what they do seem to be learning this season is that even when they surrender a lead, all is not lost. They still have the ability to pick themselves up, dust themselves off and come back to win in a shootout.

Jimmy Vesey, whose goal in the final minute of the second period tied it and ultimately forced the overtime, ended up scoring the winner in the fifth round of the shootout Saturday night as the Rangers beat the Blue Jackets, 5-4, to earn three of a possible four points in this weekend trip to Detroit and Columbus.

The win extended the Rangers’ points streak to six games (5-0-1) and lifted them above .500 at 8-7-2. It also was their fourth shootout win in four tries this season.

“I think it just shows a lot of mental strength that we have,’’ defenseman Neal Pionk said. “We’ve been through it before, and I think we’re learning from it, growing from it.”

Vesey was a key figure in the Rangers’ comeback. After goals by Pavel Buchnevich (from a Vesey assist on a two-on-one) and Chris Kreider gave the Rangers a 3-1 lead at the 8:30 mark of the second period, the Blue Jackets quickly tied it on goals by Pierre-Luc Dubois at 11:49 and Nick Foligno at 12:21.

Rangers coach David Quinn called timeout after that, but Columbus scored a shorthanded goal by Alexander Wennberg at 16:03 of the period to take its first lead.

The Rangers fought back to tie it with 53 seconds left on a goal by Vesey, who jammed in a feed from behind the net from Kevin Hayes. That made it 4-4 after two periods.

“You can’t overstate how important that goal was,’’ Quinn said. “It really reset the game for us and gave us a little bit of a good feeling going into the locker room between the second and third. But give [the Blue Jackets] credit, they played real hard in the third. They made a big push, they had some great chances, Georgie [Alexandar Georgiev] stood tall and we got two valuable road points.’’

Backup goalie Georgiev, who started in place of Henrik Lundqvist, made 34 saves in regulation plus overtime and another three saves in the shootout in five tries. He was especially big in the third period, when the Rangers were outshot 11-2 but still managed to get the game into overtime.

With both teams playing on the second night of a back-to-back, strange things figured to happen, and some crazy hockey did, in fact, ensue.

For the second consecutive night, the Rangers blew a two-goal lead, having coughed up a 2-0 advantage after two periods Friday in their 3-2 overtime loss to Detroit. On Saturday, the Rangers were without their usual leadoff man in the shootout, Mats Zuccarello, who missed the two-game trip with a groin strain.

Mika Zibanejad and Kevin Shattenkirk, who usually go second and third, each moved up one spot and each scored. But Cam Atkinson and Dubois scored for Columbus around a weak effort by Artemi Panarin.

Rangers forward Ryan Spooner, who played on the fourth line and didn’t see much ice time in the third period or overtime, was foiled by Columbus goaltender Joonas Korpisalo, and the shootout went into a fourth, then fifth round.

Georgiev stopped the next two shooters and Hayes was stopped by Korpisalo before Vesey won it.

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.