PIECE OF CAKE!
RANGERS TOP B'S ON KING'S B-DAY
BOSTON — Henrik Lundqvist didn’t look a day older than 35. Or is that 25? For on the day this birthday boy would have blown out 35 candles on his cake, the King provided all of the icing on top of the Rangers’ 2-1 victory over the Bruins on Thursday with a vintage performance.
“Someone asked me the other day what I wanted for my birthday and I said, ‘I don’t know; nothing.’ But then, today, all I wanted was to win; to play my best,” Lundqvist said after a 32-save performance in which he made a series of dazzling stops through the opening eight minutes of a game that was scoreless through two periods. “It was a really challenging game, especially at the start.
“I don’t think we were ready to play in the first, but we didn’t get hurt. We came in here and regrouped. For me, you have to stay in the moment and not overthink it, just go shot by shot. You know it’s not going to last forever, so you try to be there when your team struggles. “You try to be the difference.” The Rangers were outshot 9-3 and out-attempted 15-6 at evenstrength through the opening 20 minutes. They were able to make it to intermission at 0-0 after Lundqvist made point-blank stops against David Pastrnak at 2:25, Zdeno Chara at 4:30, Colin Miller at 7:20 and David Krejci at 7:50. Indeed, the Blueshirts would have been run into the Charles River if not for their goaltender.
“It couldn’t get any worse than that,’’ Ryan McDonagh told The Post. “There was a lot of screaming and a lot of yelling when we came in here after the first period. All the frustration that poured out kind of gave us energy that we carried into a good first shift of the second period. That kind of set the tone the rest of the way.”
Even so, the Rangers were rarely able to mount pressure against the Bruins, who stormed and crowded the crease at every opportunity. Lundqvist was called on to make several more highlight-reel stops, notably on Peter Cehlarik from the doorstep at 7:05 and then again at 16:20, and then on Patrice Bergeron from the slot at 18:23.
After that one, Lundqvist exchanged words with antagonist Brad Marchand, who, as usual, was encroaching. Or maybe the Boston winger, who scored the Bruins’ lone goal at 12:56 of the third after Pavel Buchnevich and Oscar Lindberg had scored at 5:10 and 9:35 respectively, just wanted to pass along his personal birthday wishes.
“Yeah, right,” Lundqvist said. “No.”
Buchnevich, recalled under emergency conditions after one game with the AHL Wolf Pack and in the lineup due to the absence of Michael Grabner, beat Tuukka Rask with a Russian rocket from the right circle for his first goal in 13 NHL games dating to Jan. 19. The goal came from almost the exact same spot from which the rookie, who played on a line with Mika Zibanejad and Rick Nash, had scored his first NHL goal here Nov. 5 against Rask.
Up 1-0 on the goal, which followed an outstanding penalty kill bridging the second intermission, the Rangers steadied. The lead grew off a beautiful goal from Lindberg, who very well could be Las Vegas’ second-line center next year unless the Blueshirts make a deal to ensure he’s not selected in the expansion draft. But that’s for later.
For now, the Rangers broke their two-game losing streak in which they had been outscored 9-3 at the Garden by Columbus and Washington with a throwback performance by their franchise goaltender and a very strong third period in which the club for the most part managed to stay out of trouble.
Lundqvist, who had been 11-1/4.48/.856 in four previous birthday starts, including a 2008 no-decision in which he received the quickest hook of his career at the always symbolic 19:40, had met with goaltending coach Benoit Allaire within minutes of Tuesday’s 4-1 defeat to the Caps.
“I felt good and I felt good in the Columbus game, too, but nine goals against? I wanted to get a quick look and read on it and hear what Benny thought,” Lundqvist said. “I saw and heard what I needed. There was no reason to overreact.”
Instead, Lundqvist acted, and in doing so recorded his first victory at age 35. Only 196 to go to tie Johnny Bower and Martin Brodeur, the NHL co-leaders for victories at 35 and older.