The Rangers have lived and died with one-goal advantages and one-goal games early in the season.
The two were crushed once again on Saturday night.
Sidney Crosby delivered the dagger in overtime to lift the Penguins against the Rangers, 5-4, in the field.
The Crosby winner, at 2:27 of extra time, came to the end of a long change for Tony DeAngelo, Artemi Panarin and Mika Zibanejad, who looked exhausted after being on the ice for two minutes in a row (DeAngelo it is only feared) while the Penguins made several line changes.
But the Rangers lost the game in the third period, which they had entered with a 4-3 lead after returning from a three-goal deficit. The Penguins tipped the ice during the final 20 minutes of regulation, which was the fourth time in the last five games that the Rangers have managed to score a goal in the third period.
“It seemed like a lot of fun for them in the third period,” Chris Kreider said, visibly frustrated.
“It simply came to our notice then. We have shown what we can do in outbreaks. We understand what we need to do to be successful, and then they increase the intensity a little bit in the third period there and all of a sudden we walk away from it and start going east-west and not advancing through areas. You don’t win at the NHL level by doing that. When the third period started to push, they were going north, they were putting pucks behind our D, which we had done all night and which we had successfully achieved all night and we walked away from it ”.
Jake Guentzel tied the game at four-thirty in the third with a goal that came in a second rebound attempt. Alexandar Georgiev (33 stops) had stopped the first two shots from close range but was unable to reach the third stop.
The Rangers had been razed by the Penguins in a two-game game in Pittsburgh last week, including a loss of shots. In both games, the Rangers had gotten a one-goal lead until the third period, only to see how it evaporated both times. Saturday was more or less the same as the Rangers who played their sixth straight game of a goal, with just one win to prove it.
“Probably as bad a period as we’ve played all year,” coach David Quinn said. “They beat us on all the loose records, they won every battle. … They were smarter and looked like a slightly more famous team than we had in the third period. They just won a lot of foot races to lose records, they won battles and we were very smooth around our net. “
The Rangers had come out strong and even after falling behind, they found an answer for the Penguins ’first three goals. Brendan Lemieux, Kevin Rooney (abbreviated) and Kreider tied the game before Artemi Panarin gave the Rangers the first lead of the game, 4-3, in a strike at the end of the second period.
Then came the third period, when the Rangers struggled to get records behind the penguins defense and slowly saw another advantage pass through their hands.
“That’s winning hockey,” Kreider said. “No team in the league can throw their sticks around and play east-west and try to win. You have to go north at some point. Not enough space, not enough time. You have to make their turn D. You have to make them walk 200 feet. [Instead], we are turning the lines, turning the neutral zone, without making them pull discs around the corners “.