Torts fumes in Ranger ‘W’
TORONTO — Ryan Callahan sealed the Rangers’ 4-3 shootout win over the Maple Leafs on Saturday night, a game riddled with defensive mistakes that John Tortorella would not let go regardless of the result. But Brad Richards’ conversion on the previous shot may have been just as significant.
The 31-year-old center scored his first shootout goal in nine attempts through 75 games this season, which gave a confidence boost to the veteran Tortorella trusts implicitly with the fate of the Eastern Conference’s top team.
“I haven’t had that much trouble in the six years we’ve had (shootouts) or whatever it’s been,” said Richards, who entered this season with 25 goals in 60 shootout attempts. “I wanted to get out of it, and for some reason, when everything else is going right, you see things a little differently.”
Richards picked up two assists, both on Marian Gaborik goals, and the Blueshirts (47-21-7, 101 points) reached 100 points for the seventh time in their history and the first time since 2005-06. They increased their conference lead to three points over the four-seed Penguins (46-22-6, 98), who entered the night trailing by just one but lost, 8-4, in Ottawa. Pittsburgh holds a game in hand.
Richards’ night, like that of the Rangers as a whole, was far from perfect at the Air Canada Centre. Tortorella was as animated on the bench as he’s been all season, chewing into rookie Carl Hagelin for poor defensive coverage and benching Brandon Dubinsky — again — in the first period for failing to backcheck on the Maple Leafs’ game-opening goal.
“Our backcheck (stinks),” said Tortorella, who added the Rangers’ problems are “correctable” and took pride in killing three third-period penalties with the game tied. “I thought we were ugly as hell through a number of minutes with some of the things we’re doing, . . . but killing penalties, blocking shots, we found a way to win a road game.”
Tim Connolly beat Hagelin down ice to poke a rebound past Henrik Lundqvist (22 saves) with 15:23 remaining in the third period to tie the game 3-3, just 18 seconds after Gaborik had stolen a pass in the neutral zone from Dion Phaneuf, dished to Richards, then raced up ice as Richards saucered a pass over a stick and Gaborik poked the puck in for a 3-2 lead.
“That’s what we’re capable of doing,” Gaborik said. “He knows how to set up people. He made a very nice play not to go offsides, and I knew it was going to come on my tape. (Our line) still has to be better defensively, but we created a lot of offense tonight.”
“It’s one a hell of a goal,” Tortorella said, “but they can’t get scored on twice by the (Leafs’) fourth line.”
Just as Dubinsky responded to being benched on March 1 in Carolina and called out by his coach days later in Tampa Bay, he bounced back in the second period and evened the game at 2-2 off a John Mitchell assist.
Lundqvist (22 saves) made a glove save on Tyler Bozak to open the shootout, and though Connolly scored on the backhand, Richards converted and the Leafs’ Nazem Kadri put their third try wide.
All Callahan had to do was wrist one past Jonas Gustavsson (30 saves) to end it, the Rangers now having just seven regular season games remaining.
“Their tying it up 18 seconds after we get the lead in an away building, a team can deflate pretty easily,” Callahan said. “And I don’t think we did that.”