Rangers take lead late, barely hold on to defeat Sharks

SAN JOSE, Calif. — Looks as if the Rangers made the right call keeping Julien Gauthier.

The 25-year-old winger, who had been a candidate to be returned to the minor leagues before coach Gerard Gallant played him in his 10th game of the season on Thursday night, scored the first goal of Saturday night’s game on the Rangers’ 40th shot. With 6:03 remaining in regulation, he tipped in a shot by Jacob Trouba.

Adam Fox’s empty-net goal with 1:07 left then became the game-winner in the Rangers’ 2-1 victory after Logan Couture scored for San Jose with 16.1 seconds left.

After Chris Kreider passed up a chance to shoot at an empty net and passed instead, Fox wound up with the puck just inside the blue line in the center of the ice. He beat a sprawling Couture, who desperately attempted to guard the empty net with goalie James Reimer off for an extra skater. That gave Fox an eight-game scoring streak (four goals, eight assists).

Couture scored for San Jose with 16.1 seconds left, taking a quick pass from Tomas Hertl and beating Igor Shesterkin from the right post. After a defensive breakdown by the Rangers, Shesterkin then had to make a sprawling save to stop Couture with 4.4 seconds left to preserve the victory.

“It was a huge goal late in the game,’’ Rangers coach Gerard Gallant said of Gauthier’s goal. “Zero-zero hockey game and Goat goes to the net like we ask and he got a good deflection goal. So it's awesome.''

“Obviously, you know that win's good for our group,’’ Gauthier said. “Especially [because] we stuck to it today. Because we had a lot of opportunity, a lot of shots, nothing was going in. We stuck to it and we were able to get two points.’’

The Rangers (9-6-4)  are 1-0-1 on the four-game trip, which will end with a back-to-back in Los Angeles and Anaheim on Tuesday and Wednesday.

The Rangers had been annoyed with themselves for a poor second period Thursday against Seattle, but this time, after a strong first period, they did not let up. They ended up outshooting San Jose 43-23, and Gallant was pleased.

“Since the first game of the season, that was their best game for me . . . from the drop of the puck till the end of the game,’’ he said.

The Kid Line of Alexis Lafrenière, Filip Chytil and Kaapo Kakko, which had struggled badly in Thursday’s game, rebounded with a much stronger effort. Against Seattle, the Rangers had just one scoring chance when the trio was on the ice and gave up six scoring chances. In this game, the reverse was true, with the Rangers out-chancing San Jose 6-1 with the Kid Line on the ice.

Kakko, in particular, seemed to have lost a little juice since moving off the top line. He entered Saturday’s game with three goals and four assists in 18 games but had just one assist in his last five games.

“I think the first games of the season, like the first 10 games, I’ve never played that good,’’ he said. “I got a lot of chances every game and was feeling very confident. But I don’t know right now. Now, not that good. So I don’t know. I have to try to get that back.’’

He got off to an eventful start against the Sharks, finding himself alone with the puck right in front of the net a couple of times early in the first period. He couldn’t bury one, though, and the teams played the first two periods without anyone scoring. Kakko finished with four shots on goal.

Notes & quotes: Gallant made one lineup change, inserting D Zac Jones in place of Libor Hajek. Hajek had played six straight games and Jones had sat out four straight . . . Forward Ryan Reaves was scratched for the third straight game and the sixth in the last seven. Kravtsov was a healthy scratch for the second straight game after missing two games because of an infected tooth.

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.