Another opportunity wasted by the New York Rangers, who fell at home – again – 5-2 to the Sabres. Mistakes, lack of attention to small details and an inability to finish, where have we heard these before, were the key factors in the loss. Saying it’s getting late early doesn’t really apply anymore, because past the midway point of the season, it is no longer early and the pile up of losses leaves the Blueshirts in an extremely tedious spot in the division and conference.
Game recap:
Rangers lines vs. Sabres:
Panarin-Zibanejad-Cuylle
Miller-Trocheck-Lafrenière
Perreault-Brodzinski-Raddysh
Blidh-Carrick-Rempe
Gavrikov-Schneider
Robertson-Borgen
Soucy-Morrow
Quick
Martin
Scratches: Laba (upper-body injury), Vaakanainen, Dowling
IR: Shesterkin (lower-body injury)
LTIR: Edström (lower-body injury), Sheary (lower-body injury), Fox (lower-body injury)
A few thoughts:
1) Fan Favorites: the Rangers honored some of the fan favorites Thursday as part of their 100th anniversary events. Not surprisingly, a good portion of the former players were those who made their mark dropping the gloves and/or defending their teammates, which included winning the Steven M McDonald Extra Effort Award. The only player who everyone wanted to see and was not there was Petr Prucha, who New York attempted to have in attendance but per Dan Rosen, the timing didn’t work out. Prucha was acknowledged on the scoreboard during the first TV timeout.
2) Mistakes/Lack of Attention to Detail:
Alexis Lafreniere’s mistake on the power play, an egregious giveaway and inability to stick to the game plan, which has been reviewed, helped lead to the killer goal. Jonathan Quick went down too early and should never have allowed the death knell tally, shorthanded, by Mattias Samuelsson, but the whole play was created by the poor play by Laf. He was on the first unit solely because Vincent Trochck, by rule, had to leave the ice after being cut. That decision proved to be a killer.
Prior to that goal, New York carried play the entire third period up to that moment. Trocheck scored in the first minute of the period to cut the lead to one. The first 14 minutes of the frame saw wave upon wave upon wave of Rangers, completely tilting the ice. Colten Ellis and the Sabres were hanging by a thread, barely holding off the Blueshirts. Trocheck drew a double power play from a Peyton Krebs high-stick with 5:36 left, we all had visions of at least one goal and maybe two occurring. Laf made the error, Quick went down too soon and all the momentum earned was lost.
3) Teams heading in different directions: Buffalo has turned around their season, winning 11 of 12 games coming into the contest. With the loss, the Rangers have now won only two of their past eight games and don’t have a regulation victory at home since Nov. 24 against the Blues. They’ve left Madison Square Garden with a win only five times in 20 tries this year, a mark that looks like it can’t be real but is.
I said previously, a tear down is likely needed. Thinking beyond that, looking at the current roster and pipeline, as Vince Mercogliano noted, the future does not look bright. Several teams in the East are up-and-coming and either have younger stars already there or on the come. New York is an older team whose “window” is supposedly now, but that opening looks minimal at best and the future does not look bright.
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