And on the seventh day, they scored….a lot.
That rather loud sound you may have heard Sunday night at around 9:20 p.m. was the collective exhaling of about 18,000 people at Madison Square Garden. After enduring a goal-scoring drought that felt like it had lasted most of the season, even if it in fact encompassed just over a week, the Rangers treated their restless fans to a month’s worth of goals in a 6-2 pasting of the Canadiens.
The team had gone 172 minutes without pushing a puck over the opposition’s goal line and it took a shot from little-used Brian Boyle to break the mind numbing streak this past Saturday in another offensively bankrupt 4-1 loss in St. Louis on Saturday. The losing streak had reached three straight and the goal scoring ineptitude stood at five goals in the last five games.
A frustrated Henrik Lundqvist seemed to bite his lip after a lifeless 2-0 loss at home to Ottawa on Thursday, saying, “Four goals in four games is obviously not enough. We need to step up offensively. We played well defensively, but you’re not going to win games if you can’t score, that’s pretty simple. I’m so mad right now.”
Mad indeed, as The King has now surrendered two goals or fewer in 17 of his last 20 starts. Until the explosion against the Habs on Sunday most of those have been nail biters due to the teams’ toothless attack up front.
The good news, along with the goal orgy Sunday, is the fact that Lundqvist’s superb play has the Blueshirts in the midst of a 9-3-4 run after the November/December malaise that at times seemed terminal. More good news—Donald Brashear’s hamstring injury has him mercifully out of the lineup and Ales Kotalik’s benching has him in street clothes so Enver Lisin and Aaron Voros are back and have instantly contributed.
Vinny Prospal’s surgically repaired knee has reunited the team’s top line with Brandon Dubinsky and Marion Gaborik and it has injected life into the entire lineup. The trio combined for eight points in the game against the Canadiens, the Rangers most spirited effort in weeks and one coach John Tortorella should be looking at as a springboard to some consistency.
“Everybody played for one another tonight [Sunday vs Habs]. They stood up for each other and we finally found a way to score some goals,” Tortorella said after the 6-2 win. “We responded tonight to the way the emotion of the game was going. That’s not something this team has always done.”
The coach was referring to the team’s feistiness during a late second-period melee that featured a rare Wade Redden fight (against Benoit Poullot) and the usually docile Ever Lisin getting into it with the Canadiens’ Tomas Plekanec. All to the delight of the Garden faithful.
The other catalyst and a player the Rangers need big contributions from the rest of the way was Ryan Callahan, who is developing a knack for making big plays that seem to jump-start this team. His four-point night Sunday included the first goal of the game that got them back in it followed by a marvelous effort on a shorthanded breakaway that Dubinsky finished to tie it.
One night certainly doesn’t change the fact the Rangers are still languishing at the bottom of the league in goals scored but the fact they have survived this awful offensive stretch and still sit in sixth place in the conference should provide a bit of a lift.
That’s right—breath in and exhale slowly. The Rangers actually scored some goals. The famine has ended.
ICE CHIPS
Prior to his recent injury, Rangers fans had to be asking, why was Brashear continually dressing? Tortorella has been sitting Enver Lisin, who has played well since his early season troubles, and Aaron Voros, who brings so much more to the rink than Brashear. For a club that is as offensively challenged as the Rangers the sitting of the speedy Lisin is particularly vexing. The coach has consistently cited “numbers” when asked about Brashear playing over Voros and Lisin. The only number we can assume he’s referring to is Brashear’s $2.8 million, two-year contract. Is there a number we’re missing?
Though slumping badly before breaking out against the Habs on Sunday with a goal and two helpers, give Gaborik credit for being a stand-up guy in a locker room that is sometimes full of finger pointers. Without being asked about his missed assignment that led to the winning goal against Ottawa last week, the winger, who has carried this club all season long, took immediate blame for the loss. “I totally lost my man, it was Kovalev,” Gaborik explained after the game. “It was my mistake. I should have been right there. It cost us the game.” It’s called leadership and there are several Rangers veterans who hopefully took the cue.
Every week from here on out is big, but the Rangers have four games coming up against some of their closest pursuers in the East this week. Tampa Bay is at the Garden Tuesday followed by road games in Philadelphia Thursday and Montreal Saturday before it’s back home for the Penguins next Monday. Like we said, big.