Recap: Lack of Offense Leads to Another L in LA

The Rangers continue sleepwalking their way through the West Coast road trip as they drop another two points to the Kings in Jonathan Quick’s return to Los Angeles. His touching tribute video would unfortunately become the lone highlight on the Rangers side of things as another sloppy start resulted in them chasing the game and eventually coming up short in one they easily could have and should have had.

A couple of changes to the lineup going into the late night puck drop as Tyler Pitlick, who missed the last couple of weeks with a lower-body injury, made his return to the lineup in place of Nick Bonino. Additionally, Zac Jones slotted back in as Erik Gustafsson would be out day-to-day with an injury of his own.

1st Period:

It would not be a great opening period for the Rangers. While each team saw an early chance on the breakaway, the Rangers would spend the majority of the period chasing play around, generating little to no offense. Trevor Moore first had a chance all alone on Jonathan Quick and soon after it was K’Andre Miller getting the chance on a breakaway the other way. Neither player would capitalize which kept the score locked at zero but as play went on, the game did not feel as close as it may have looked.

Jonathan Quick came up with a big point blank save on Mikey Anderson about a quarter of the way into the period as he appeared to be the only Ranger who came to play tonight. At the midway mark of the period, Zac Jones was called for holding which gave the Kings their first power play of the night. The Rangers did a good job of killing off the two minutes but outside of that, they really had nothing to pride themselves on throughout this first period.

In the final minute of the period, Trevor Moore threw the puck on net following a spin-o-rama which resulted in a rebound for Kevin Fiala to pick up and roof over a sprawling Jonathan Quick.

This would give LA the 1-0 lead to cap off an extremely underwhelming period for the Rangers. The Kings out-shot them 12-2, completely dominating play in the process. On top of the 12 shots LA was credited with, there were about 10 more shot attempts that the Rangers were able to get in front off which goes to show just how out of control they were throughout the first twenty.

2nd Period:

There was a slightly better pace to start the second but the Rangers were still struggling to find ways to put the puck on net. The Kings had a chance off the rush which resulted in the Rangers net being dislodged which brought play to a halt. This sort of hurt the Rangers momentum as Jacob Trouba laid a massive hit on Fiala which could have resulted in a rush going the other way had the whistle not been blown.

Not long after that sequence, Alexis Lafrenière would get taken down behind the Kings net by defenseman Matt Roy which left him shaken up and slow to get up. This gave the Rangers their first power play of the night as Roy was called for interference. On the bright side, the Rangers double their shot count on the power play. Unfortunately, that would be from 2 to 4 and the Rangers wouldn’t find a way to capitalize on the man advantage.

Play slowed down from there but the Rangers were picking it up a bit as they were getting more pucks on net and were doing a much better job of keeping the Kings out of their end of the ice.

With about five and a half to go in the second, Mika Zibanejad did a great job of intercepting an attempted outlet pass from the Kings to send it over to Adam Fox at the point. Instead of looking for the shot, Fox sent the puck over to Chris Kreider who was right at David Rittich’s doorstep and had nothing but net to redirect the puck into. 1-1 game.

With under two minutes to go in the second, K’Andre Miller gave up the puck in the neutral zone which led to Jaret Anderson-Dolan taking it to the Rangers net and creating a scoring chance that Quinton Byfield would capitalize on to make it a 2-1 game. Brutal giveaway from Miller and just an overall tough sequence to watch just a couple of minutes after the Rangers were finally able to find the back of the net.

LA would take the one goal lead to intermission courtesy of a late period goal, just as they had in the first. It was an all around better period for the Rangers but more or less the same song and dance as they were still trailing on the scoreboard. They picked it up in the shots on goal department as they had the advantage against LA 9-6 throughout the second but still had their work cut out for them if they were going to find a way to turn the narrative of this one around in the third.

3rd Period:

The Rangers went back to the power play five minutes into the game’s final period as Vladislav Gavrikov sent the puck out of play. The Rangers would hit the post twice throughout the man advantage but again, wouldn’t find a way to convert. While they still trailed on the scoreboard, the Rangers were continuing to play better as play went on. Alex Laferreire had a breakaway attempt that was brilliantly defended by Zac Jones to keep him from getting a shot off.

Just over the midway point, Alexis Lafrenière, who already went down hard earlier in the game and ripped a shot off the post, would continue to not be able to catch a break as a shot from Artemiy Panarin redirected up and caught him in the face. This left him on the ice, needing some assistance before heading to the Rangers locker room but would end up not missing a shift as he really continued to battle through adversity.

While the Rangers were finally starting to show some consistent positives, time was continuing to quickly run out. With five minutes to go, their chances were slowly becoming fewer and further between. With under two minutes to go in the game, Adam Fox took a stick up high from Trevor Moore as he circled center ice with a fumbling puck.

This gave the Rangers an incredible opportunity to tie things up as they’d finish out regulation on the power play. Once they secured the puck off the face-off, Jonathan Quick headed to the bench and Alexis Lafrenière had as great of a scoring chance as anyone had throughout the night right on the doorstep. Rittich would get a pad on it which would end up saving the game as the Kings fought off the remaining seconds to spoil Quick’s return to LA, beating the Rangers 2-1.

This is now two games in a row the Rangers looked pretty terrible in and will have no time to dwell on their mistakes as they’re right back at it Sunday Night in Anaheim to take on the Ducks. Have to think this team is coming up on another must win/can’t lose showing as their position atop the Metropolitan standings continues to be in jeopardy.