First For Torts Falls Short

The Rangers lost 2-1 to Toronto in a shoot-out. Some themes from coach James Tortorella's first game as Rangers head coach were:

• The new Torts up tempo, aggressive game had some good stretches. The Rangers kept the game in the Leaf end early on.
  
  The Dark Ranger: "Ranger fans, your first period is sponsored by Red Bull."
  


• The downside of this new up tempo game is that the Rangers are not in shape to play it for a full 60.
  
  Larry Brooks: John Tortorella says some of the troops are pooped.
  


• Hoorah! Petr Prucha got some serious ice time, but...
  
  Hockey Rodent: Petr Prucha not only enjoyed 2:15 on the power play. He also totalled as many ticks as did Nikolai Zherdev! Pru bolted behind enemy skaters twice and looked his best early on, finding the seams others miss. His presence was not so apparent as the game matured. Stamina issues? If so, he was not alone.
  


• Better movement on the power play.
  


• Rangers stunk at winning faceoffs.
  
  Scotty Hockey: Stat of the night - Rangers won 18 of 54 faceoffs, 33%. That is pathetic, especially against the Leafs. Concede the puck, concede the momentum.
  


• Dan Girardi and Marc Staal looked good together. And even Redden had his moments.
  
  Rangers Review: Marc Staal and Wade Redden was absolute beasts out there. Redden in particular looked built to play this style of hockey. They kept the puck in, they got the puck on net, and they were decisive with what they were doing.
  
  
• The Rangers still can't score and their shoot-out skills have fallen off a cliff.
  
  The Manic Ranger: The Rangers shooters baffled me in the shootout tonight. Naslund brought in way too much speed if he was looking to open Toskala up and hit him 5 hole. Chris Drury should not partake in the shootout any longer. He just is not good at it. Give Prucha or Dawes his spot.


• Torts in a hateful nutshell.
  
  Chris Nicholas: If you're looking for John Tortorella in a nutshell, this last quote says it all...
  
  "In Tampa, we'd get new players in and after a couple games, they'd ask to meet with me and say, 'I don't know what it is. Torts hates me,'" Tortorella's former boss Jay Feaster said. "I'd say, 'Don't worry - he hates all of us equally.'"
  

However, the bottomline is that this is still the same 2-1 hockey team we've been watching, and they are still stuck on the wrong side of that low score. What's the line about putting lipstick on a pig?

But getting a point does not hurt the cause. Or does it?

Jess Rubenstein / Prospect Park:
To Make This Tort's Team He Has to Lose Now --

The best thing for the Tortorella era would be to begin with a huge thud like 3 losses in 4 nights especially this close to the trading deadline. Do not give the playoff chase any kind of pulse because long term goals strongly say that losing today makes for a better tomorrow.

Start with losses that push the Rangers further down the playoff picture and allow Tortorella the chance to push players off the roster that hurt the team's future. With just a week until the trade deadline, wins do more damage to Tortorella's future as he will not have the ammo to say to Sather that "this guy has to go"...

----

Parting Shots from Classy Coach Clueless.

Tom Renney realizes a little late that the Tom Renney Defense At All Costs system might need some players with offensive skills. Duh!

Larry Brooks / NY Post:
FIRED RENNEY LEAVES WITH REGRETS --

Ask Tom Renney if he has any regrets, as The Post did yesterday afternoon, and the former Rangers head coach says he certainly does.

"I would have pushed harder for [GM] Glen [Sather] to give Jags more money so we could have kept him, and I should have pushed harder at Christmas time for Shanny," Renney, dismissed on Monday just shy of five full years on the job, told The Post by phone, alluding to Jaromir Jagr and Brendan Shanahan.

"Jaromir's situation was different, but as I told Brendan when I saw him around that time, I was the one standing in his way."...

----

ICINGS:

HockeyFights.com:
Naslund Tries to Spark Rangers --

Thursday night’s slate of games only produced one fight. Who would have thought Markus Naslund would be involved in it?

The cause of the scrap occurred six minutes into last night’s Rangers-Leafs game. Ian White, who ironically has also fought Ilya Kovalchuk this season, took a run at Naslund along the boards. Naslund moved out of the way in time and delivered a gloved punch to White’s face before skating away. White followed him to the front of the Toronto net and the two exchanged some shoves before dropping the gloves. The fight wasn’t much, just some grappling until the linesmen intervened, and New York ended up losing in a shootout.

Even though it was Naslund’s second career bout, it was the first time that he discarded his gloves...

----

HockeyFights.com:
Markus Naslund vs Ian White -- Who won?

• Draw -- 68.4%
• Ian White -- 23.7%
• Markus Naslund -- 7.9%

Related Articles by Categories