After beating Devils, Rangers get the feeling puck luck is on their side
The Rangers celebrate a goal by right wing Kaapo Kakko as New Jersey Devils goaltender Vitek Vanecek reacts in the second period of an NHL hockey game at Madison Square Garden on Monday, Dec. 12, 2022. Credit: Kathleen Malone-Van Dyke
So, is this it? Is this the Rangers turnaround their fans have been waiting for all season?
The Blueshirts’ 4-3 overtime win over the Metropolitan Division-leading Devils on Monday night at the Garden gave them their longest winning streak of the season, four games, and put them into the first wild card playoff spot in the Eastern Conference. It had them feeling better about themselves than they have in some time.
“It’s great, especially after those games what we had before, where we had the stretch when we were losing games that we should win,’’ said Filip Chytil, who scored the game-winner against the Devils at 2:15 of the overtime. “So now it feels good. But we have to keep going, and [keep the] winning streak going.’’
The Rangers, 15-10-5, have muddled through most of this season, failing to live up to the high expectations that stemmed from their 52-win regular season and Eastern Conference Finals appearance in 2021-22.
Last season they got unbelievable goaltending from Igor Shesterkin and routinely won games they didn’t deserve to win. This season, Shesterkin had only been good, rather than otherworldly, and they had a tendency to blow leads and lose, rather than pull off improbable comebacks.
But since their Nov. 28 loss to the Devils, when they blew a two-goal lead and Shesterkin declared himself “ashamed’’ of how he was playing, the Rangers are 5-1-1. They caught a couple of breaks when they went on the road to play Vegas and Colorado at a time when both teams were severely compromised by injuries to their roster.
The 2-1 shootout win at Colorado had a throwback feel to it, when Shesterkin stopped 41 of 42 shots in regulation and overtime, and stopped both shootout attempts. And Monday’s win over the Devils had a similar last-season feel. In it, they were outscored 2-0 and outshot 6-0 over the first 10 minutes of the game, but they picked their game up enough, and got enough pivotal plays. t
A penalty shot save by Shesterkin on Jack Hughes, a power play goal 1:08 later, and the tying goal seven seconds after that led to the comeback.
“Sometimes it’s hard, but we had a three-game winning streak [coming into Monday], and it feels like we can get back to the game what we had last season, and now is coming back to us,’’ Chytil said. “And yeah… we are believing.’’
Coach Gerard Gallant made some changes with the team down 2-0 after Dawson Mercer’s goal at 4:46 of the first period. He swapped the centers on his top two lines, moving Mika Zibanejad between wingers Artemi Panarin and Barclay Goodrow, and reuniting Chytil with his Kid Line wingers, Alexis Lafrenière and Kaapo Kakko. He also split up the K’Andre Miller-Jacob Trouba defense pair, moving Braden Schneider up to play with Miller and dropping Trouba to the third pair, with Libor Hajek.
It all worked, and now the Rangers are feeling as though the bad puck luck they had early in the season is turning in their favor.
“It's starting to, yeah, I think so,’’ forward Vincent Trocheck said. “You're not going to be able to come back against teams like that every time, so we’ve got to make sure that we're playing a full 60 minutes. But, you know, I like the direction that we're headed.’’
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.
