Flames no Blueshirt pushovers

The Calgary Flames have had trouble winning at the Gardenin recent seasons. Opportunistic scoring and stellar goaltending changed that on this trip.

Johnny Gaudreau and Garnet Hathaway each scored twice and backup goalie David Rittich made 44 saves as the Flames snapped a six-game losing streak at the Garden with a 4-1 victory over the Rangers on Sunday night.

“I felt great and I want to say thank you to my defense,” said Rittich, who won for the second time this season as the Flames improved to 5-3-0 and scored three or more goals for the seventh straight game. “We know we had to be better in the third period and we got the two points.”

Mika Zibanejad scored for the Rangers, the last-place team in the Metropolitan Division at 25-1.

The Rangers were coming off an overtime loss at Washington on Wednesday after winning in a shootout over Colorado the previous night. The Rangers have had trouble scoring goals under new coach David Quinn.

They have yet to win in regulation. The Rangers have just 19 goals in their first eight games, including one shootout win and one in overtime.

“We have to find ways to score goals.” Quinn said. “We’ve got to be more tenacious with our shooting mentality. It’s frustrating.”

“It’s too bad. I feel like these types of games are starting to add up, unfortunately,” said Henrik Lundqvist, who made 22 saves in the defeat. “We are playing good enough to win games but we are not finding ways to win games. It’s obviously something we need to change fast.”

Mars Zuccarello echoed Lundqvist’s growing angst as the Rangers struggle to get wins.

“We created a lot of chances and we can sit here and say that we didn’t play a bad game, but we lost,” said the 31-year-old Norwegian forward, who leads the Rangers with six assists. “So, it’s not good enough. We have to come to practice, talk about it and see what can do better.”

The Rangers came into the contest with a 10-1-1 record against the Flames, starting with a 2-1 victory at home on Nov. 22, 2010.