Win a period, win a game. That was the story of last night's game, when the Rangers finally scored two goals followed by an empty-netter in the 3rd period to steal a game from the NJ Devils, 3-0. The Devils were doing everything right for the first two periods, except score. The Rangers were pulling their old Tortorella rope-a-dope. That is "stay patient," guard the King, let the other team punch themselves out by keeping the puck in the Rangers end for most of the second period. A brilliant, but flawed, strategy that is held together only by the royal greatness of Henrik Lunqvist.
Lunqvist stood tall and removed the goat horns from the head of Dan Girardi with some help from Ryan McDonagh. Gerardi was doing his walking dead imitation with several early giveaways that were erased by Lundqvist and McDonagh. Girardi was given a near 6 minute timeout by Tortorella midway through the 2nd period to collect his thoughts and his game. Dano quickly redeemed himself in the third period by ripping Kid Kreider's soft setup past Marrr-teee, who was screened by Stepan. The resurrection had begun. Krider followed that up with another bullet past the Broduer, the Donut King, off Anisimov’s slick pass to make it 2-0. The dead men were skating.
The pugilists were given the night off. So Prust and Rupp contributed in other ways, they each took a two-minute minor for roughing.
It's pretty clear that in order for the Rangers to have any success the defense has to score. The Rangers are not getting enough scoring out of their forwards. If the Rangers continue to win it's a bet that the defense is doing the heavy lifting.
ICINGS:
#HotRubber -- Norman "Boomer" Esiason was claiming this morning on his Boomer and Carton Show that the NHL ice expert, Dan Craig, told him the pucks were bouncing around the first two periods because they had not been properly refrigerated before the game. It had nothing to do with the ice conditions. He added that if you noticed the puck action was better by the third period once the pucks had been properly chilled. Okay, so MSG forgot to ice their pucks?
#ReverseTortorella -- Tortorell was asked during his press conference why he took that timeout late in the 2nd period following a roughing call on Prust. Tortorella said they were "tired" and needed a rest. Later Torts was asked if the team was "tired" because of the short rest since the Washington series, he told the report that he didn't believe in any of that "tired" garbage.
#CharityHat -- Dan Girardi ends up wearing the Broadway Hat.
#HockeyPhalanx -- The defensive formation that the Rangers find themselves frequently playing in order to protect The King.
Not my take on the game at all. Torts moved Kreider up onto the second line for offense. He wanted more scoring 5 on 5 in this series, and was less worried that it would be a 1-0 game that would make a Kreider mistake a game killer.
The Rangers were okay in the first period, until they tired at the end of it. The Rangers were a tired hockey club again by the middle of the second.
The time out was brilliant for two reasons. Torts reminded the team that this was not the time to rest and gave them their legs back. Second, he also began to use the fourth line - also brilliant, but dumb that he did not do it sooner. They had life and kept the Devils in THEIR end.
Come the third, the team knew it only needed to put it all out for 20 minutes, and they did.
If we win tomorrow, Rangers in five. If not, this can go six or seven. Either was, no way the King loses four.
Get tickets for the "Devils game" at low prices. Blogs such as Fire and Ice, In Lou We Trust, and HFBoards provide you outlets to Devils fans who are looking for seats. The Devils are trying to keep the Rangers fans away, and selling for less to do this.
Buy low and wear Blue!