Another game where the Rangers couldn’t stop the other team from shooting and another game where the goals piled up. This is what’s going to happen every time Henrik Lundqvist is human unless the Rangers start playing much better hockey. The officiating was very suspect today, but that’s no excuse for the Bruins to generate 56 shot attempts at even strength. It all adds up to a second straight loss.
The Good
The Offense Picks Up
The Rangers I thought, cycled the puck extremely well today and generated off the cycle, accumulating 42 shot attempts and an impressive 13 high-danger scoring chances. This is something that we hadn’t seen against Nashville and Montreal. The Rangers were good at getting shots through to the net today. Granted, I still think they could have shot a little more, but the offensive possession was there. Then again, offense was never the problem with this team.
Keith Yandle Returns to Form
Last time, I called Yandle out for subpar play the last few games, but he was excellent today. He was the only Rangers defenseman able to settle down a furious Boston attack today, with smooth transition plays. He was the only Rangers D positive in shot attempts aside from Dylan McIlrath who didn’t play much. This is nothing new. Yandle has been the Rangers best defenseman all year. Unfortunately, only the heavily-penalized McIlrath played fewer even strength minutes on D than Yandle today. I have to wonder if Alain Vigneault watches the same games I do.
The Bad
Penalty Kill Struggling
This was another multi-goal game against an ice cold Rangers penalty kill which is 13 for its last 18 – a very poor 72%. They had a nice game against Nashville going 5-for-5, but I thought Lundqvist really had to stand on his head on some of those kills. It’s no surprise that a team that is one of the worst in the league at exiting their own zone and clearing their crease is starting to struggle on the PK. For that reason, I fear this will become a norm after a hot start.
The McIlrath Incident
No question the Belesky hit on Stepan was late. I credit McIlrath for stepping in. I don’t like defensemen fighting, but I digress. The issue I have is that the Rangers were forced to go with five defensemen [well, really one if you want to count the guys who actually played defense today] for 17 minutes, and Boston ended up on the powerplay. What the league is telling me here, is that dirty hits will be rewarded with powerplays, and defending your teammates from dirty hits will be punished. And the league wonders why it has a problem with questionable hits and resulting injuries. Worse yet, Stepan could be on the shelf with an injury now. But keep rewarding it, NHL.
The Glass
The Defense Fails Miserably Yet Again
I have had it -absolutely had it- with watching this team attempt to play defense. So you know what? We’re going to talk about the defense by itself, in it’s own post. Stay tuned for that.
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The Rangers are back at it tomorrow afternoon at home against Philadelphia.
Thee Stars
1)Keith Yandle
2)Dylan McIlrath
3)Rick Nash
Was there pizza? The offense tends to show up to games, so yes. Pizza record: 15-7-1
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