The New York Rangers performance against the Pittsburgh Penguins was a microcosm of their season. The Rangers, plagued by their inconsistent ways, gave away a two-goal lead for the second consecutive game, but rallied to beat the Penguins 4-3 in overtime on Kevin Klein's second overtime goal of the season. Klein scored 3:45 into overtime on a slap shot through traffic from a few steps inside the blue line. He also scored in overtime against the New Jersey Devils on Oct. 21. Klein has a career-high six goals this season, including three game-winners. Forwards J.T. Miller, Rick Nash and Kevin Hayes also scored for the Rangers. Pittsburgh forwards Evgeni Malkin and Steve Downie scored 24 seconds apart late in the third period to force overtime. Klein didn't miss a shift after getting struck in the left ear by Penguins forward Zach Sill's high stick late in the first period. Klein, who was bloodied, said he received at least a dozen stitches to repair the damage to his ear. The Penguins toughed it out themselves to get a point despite playing without four of their top-six forwards (Chris Kunitz, Patric Hornqvist, Beau Bennett and Pascal Dupuis) and two of their top-four defenseman (Kris Letang and Olli Maatta). Malkin scored from the slot off a feed from Brandon Sutter at 15:17 of the third period and Downie scored later to tie the game. Staal swung and missed in an attempt to clear the bouncing puck out of the high slot before it came to Downie, who beat New York goalie Henrik Lundqvist with a slap shot from the right hash marks. It was a tough night for Penguins rookie defenseman Brian Dumoulin, who was on the ice for three goals and had giveaways that directly led to goals by Nash and Hayes that put the Rangers up 2-1 and 3-1, respectively. Dumoulin was in the lineup because Maatta was in Pittsburgh getting an undisclosed injury re-evaluated. Defenseman Robert Bortuzzo returned to the Penguins lineup after serving a two-game suspension. The Rangers gave away a two-goal lead Saturday against the Detroit Red Wings before losing 3-2 in regulation. They felt they let the Penguins back into the game Monday by sitting back too much after Hayes scored at 12:58 of the third period to put them up by two goals.
Klein echoed Girardi, saying the Rangers remained upbeat on the bench after Downie scored. The Rangers have been battling to stay above water all season. They beat the Penguins 5-0 at the Garden on Nov. 11, but followed that up with a 4-4-2 record before Pittsburgh returned to New York on Monday. New York won four of five games during that stretch, including shutout wins against the Montreal Canadiens (5-0) and the Philadelphia Flyers (2-0 and 3-0), but they also lost three times to the Tampa Bay Lightning and blew the lead in Detroit.
The Rangers gave away a third-period lead against the Colorado Avalanche before losing in a shootout on Nov. 13. They had a 2-1 lead after the first period against the Penguins in Pittsburgh on Nov. 15 and lost that one 3-2 in a shootout.
Pens Quotes
Steve Downie: "I think we were buzzing all [third] period. We came out and I think we controlled the pace of the third and we got the bounces we deserved. We played well and I thought it was a good comeback."Mike Johnston: "Certainly with the [defense] pairs there is a little bit of a learning curve there when you're trying to play with a new partner and you're trying to read off him under heavy forechecking pressure. But I thought we escaped our zone pretty well for having all new pairs except for [Rob] Scuderi and [Simon] Despres."
Opposition View: 'We're a team from New York, we have a divine right to win the Stanley Cup every season'
No comments:
Post a Comment