Recap: Rangers Revert to Old Ways, Lose 4-0 to Carolina

Another night with important points on the line became a painful reminder that the Rangers biggest problem is their core. The top players continue to underperform, make costly mistakes and fall flat when it matters most. Another night where they gave up a goal before even starting to play the game as more poor decisions resulted in them falling behind on the scoreboard before the game truly got away from them in a complete collapse to start the third period.

1st Period: 

Not even a full minute into the game, a costly error put the Rangers down 1-0 on the scoreboard. A neutral zone turnover from Artemi Panarin gave Carolina the chance to go the other way. Taylor Hall was able to enter the zone, stopping along the boards to find Andrei Svechnikov with a perfect pass, allowing him to walk right down through the high slot. His shot fluttered through some traffic and sailed right by Shesterkin to make it 1-0 56 seconds in.  

That’s now nine goals on the season the Rangers have allowed within the first two minutes of a game. Fifth goal within the first minute of a game. About five minutes after the goal, Sam Carrick welcomed Riley Stillman to the NHL by dropping the gloves for a quick little scrap. For those wondering, yes, there is relation to former NHLer Cory Stillman as Riley is his son who made his NHL debut against the Rangers tonight.

Two minutes out from the midway point of the period, FIlip Chytil had a great break to the net that ended up drawing the first penalty of the game. Jordan Martinook was called for slashing which brought out the Rangers top power play unit. They would stay on for the majority of those two minutes and came up with three shots but no goals as they couldn’t get anything past Freddie Anderson. 

The Rangers continued to have solid chances as the period went on but just couldn’t seem to fully connect on anything. With just under five minutes to go in the period, Alexis Lafrenière took Svechnikov down with a cross check which gave Carolina their first man advantage of the night. The Rangers answered that with a strong penalty kill to keep things moving which would essentially end up closing out the period. 

A pretty flat opening twenty for the Rangers save for the power play and spurts of energy from the bottom six forwards. Shots were 10-9 in favor of the Rangers who also led in high danger chances 5-3 despite Carolina out-chancing them overall. 

2nd Period:

After a fairly slow start to the period Eric Robinson snuck through as the Rangers were changing and had a point blank chance all alone that required a key save from Shesterkin. That would be the first of two point blank chances as a few shifts later, Svechnikov beat everyone and came in for an up close break and ended up colliding a bit with Shesterkin after a shove from who else but Ryan Lindgren. Thankfully, everyone involved appeared to be okay. 

As if Shesterkin wasn’t doing enough to stop the puck, he made a beautiful cross ice pass to nearly give Filip Chytil a perfect chance on the breakaway. However, the puck was just a touch out of reach for Chytil to get a clean grasp on the chance. Shesterkin continued to be the story for the Rangers as he was coming up with massive saves, including on a 2-on-1 that came just after Shesterkin tried to draw a penalty behind the net by taking a hit while playing the puck. 

At the midway mark of the evening, the Rangers were sent back to the power play as Seth Jarvis was called for interference as he took down Will Borgen in front of the Rangers’ net away from the play. Chris Kreider had without question the best chance of the night for the Rangers as Trocheck found him wide open right at the doorstep but just couldn’t get enough on the shot which allowed Anderson the time to take away the space. 

In the closing minutes of the period, the Rangers had a nice burst of offense which was later interrupted by a cross-checking penalty from Ryan Lindgren. This would give Carolina another power play with just over two and a half to go in the second. Kreider and Zibanejad had a quality shorthanded chance on an odd-man rush which would be nothing compared to Trocheck’s chance. 

Stop me if you’ve heard this before, but the Rangers had a BREAKAWAY attempt and opted to PASS THE PUCK BACKWARDS. I don’t know what else to say about that, completely baffling and inexcusable. To make matters worse, Carolina went the other way with it and made it 2-0. Jackson Blake dished it ahead to Mikko Rantanen who found Svechnikov in the slot to put it home. Beyond infuriating. 

In other news, here’s a fun, painfully Rangers, statline:

Shots at the end of two were 20-18 in favor of the Rangers who continued to lead in high danger but trailed in overall chances. The big difference in this one through two periods was two mindless mistakes resulting in goals for Carolina to take a 2-0 lead into the final period of regulation.

3rd Period:

Peter Laviolette hit the line blender for the third period as Kreider was on the right side of Chytil and Panarin, Trocheck was in between Cuylle and Smith leaving Zibanejad with Kaliyev and Lafrenière. This wouldn’t do much of anything as Sebastian Aho made it 3-0 just 64 seconds into the period. The Rangers couldn’t get the puck out of the zone and some strong pressure from Svechnikov allowed him to find Aho for the shot. 

To make matters worse, another minute or so later Zibanejad chased the puck behind the net and Seth Jarvis was all alone in front of Shesterkin where he was able to beat him with a clean shot to make it a 4-0 game. 

With twelve minutes to go, Sebastian Aho was sent off for hooking to give the Rangers another power play. They couldn't get anything going on the advantage which allowed for boo's to fill the Garden as the two minutes came and went without the Rangers generating even a shot on goal.

Fact of the matter was, this game was over within the opening minutes of the third period as this team completely fell apart after giving up that late goal in the second period. The Garden fell silent following the power play that had nothing to show for as all the life was taken from both the crowd and the player's efforts on the ice. Mika Zibanejad had a breakaway with three and a half to go and couldn't finish which pretty much summed up the night.

4-0 would be the final in another painful Rangers loss as they now have just five games left before the break for Four Nations. They're back at it on the road Saturday Afternoon as they pay the Boston Bruins a visit in the first half of an important weekend back-to-back.