While New York City faces the snowstorm, so do the Rangers.
The same night the Bronze team had to address their decision to part ways with team’s second highest paid defender Tony DeAngelo, the Rangers pulled off their third win of the season behind a goal. of Chris Kreider’s third period to defeat the Penguins 3-1 Monday night at Madison Square Garden.
The Rangers had only scored two goals in the third period and had not scored in the last five games ahead of Monday’s game. Kreider broke that streak at 11:10 of the final box with a redirect from a pointless shot from Adam Fox at the top of the area.
Artemi Panarin got an insurance account with a second on the clock, plus two assists, to complete a three-point performance. While Rangers goalkeeper Igor Shesterkin got his second win of the season, he deflected 25 of the 26 shots he faced, including nine stops in the final 20 minutes to secure the win.
General manager Jeff Gorton said before the game that the team had to focus on winning, and the Rangers came out and plowed through a team of Penguins they had lost in their previous three games against them.
“I can’t say how proud I am of our group,” head coach David Quinn said after the win. “It’s been a very difficult 24, 36 hours and the way we play together.”
Aside from being without DeAngelo, the Rangers lost to Kaapo Kakko over the COVID-19 Protocol roster and remembered AHL Hartford’s Jonny Brodzinski for his first game with a Rangers uniform. Anthony Bitetto, who had been with the team’s taxi squad to start the season, replaced DeAngelo for his Rangers debut.
To add more pressure to the already exhausted Rangers lineup, defender Brendan Smith collided with Brandon Tanev at 5:12 p.m., and went straight to the locker room, where he remained with an upper body injury.
The Rangers were forced to shoot with five defenders the rest of the night.
Whether it was the collective inexperience of the lineup or the extraordinary strength of the Penguins that handled the record, the Rangers made a lot of penalties throughout the game. Both the second and third penalty periods began as a result of infractions in the last two minutes of each frame.
Julian Gauthier, who hadn’t played since Jan. 19 against the Devils, was called to stay minutes after the Rangers took the 2-1 lead to force them to compete abbreviated for the sixth time in the game. However, the Rangers’ death penalty unit was their strongest component and avoided the penguin man’s six chance lead.
The Rangers had one of their third most competitive periods so far this season, blocking seven shots and refusing to give the penguins time or space.
“The way we played this third period was really good for us, just moving forward and understanding that we can win these games,” Fox said. “We have to play a certain way to do it.”
The Penguins came out of the first period with the lead for the third time in their last four games against the Rangers. Jason Zucker quickly pulled the puck off the boards and grabbed Shesterkin away from the fold, filling it to get the score 1-0 at 9:05.
But the Rangers took advantage of a delayed Penguins penalty with an additional ice skater later in the second, as Kevin Rooney scored his second goal in so many games to tie it.
“Listen, I know what our record is, we’ve felt pretty good with a lot of things we’ve done this year; I know it may sound crazy, but we really have it,” Quinn said. “We just have to keep moving forward and keep building. We have five of our last six points and we are pending ”.