Deflated Blueshirts need boost, or brake
OTTAWA — There was a truck positioned in the arena as a promotional vehicle, and row upon row of empty seats in the upper bowl plus a fair number of prime unoccupied locations in the lower stands, as well. Who knew the playoffs were in Brooklyn this year?
Actually, more to the point, who knew the Rangers would come out with such a pedestrian effort in what became a 2-1 defeat to the Senators in the opener of the second round?
Maybe it was just the natural letdown that comes when a compelling series ends and a new one begins. Maybe there’s a time lapse that goes into revving up a rivalry that has been dormant since the last time these teams met in the playoffs five years ago.
Or maybe the Rangers just were unable to generate enough emotion and momentum on their own in a quiet building that lacked atmosphere, against an opponent whose disciplined trap sucks the life out of a game. And maybe, it’s time the speedy Rangers slowed down in order to grind this thing in their favor.
“Obviously we want to play fast, but we can’t rush it up with one guy trying to break through, give it away and have them come back and shove it up our ass,” Mats Zuccarello told The Post. “It’s important for us to be patient with the puck against their trap, or whatever they call it.”
The Rangers weren’t patient enough, smart enough or disciplined enough, not by a long shot. They were shorthanded four times overall, including three times in a first period in which Henrik Lundqvist propped up his team in stopping all 21 shots he faced, nine on the man-advantages.
When the Blueshirts weren’t shorthanded, they were icing the puck or having plays broken up in the neutral zone or at the offensive line. Not until they generated some zone time in the third period were the Rangers able to make more than cameo appearances in the offensive end of the ice. Otherwise, it was one and done, in and out.
“We have to be sharper with the puck. We spent too much time trying to get through,” said Derek Stepan. “And we have to be disciplined. We can’t take too many penalties.”
The Rangers took their cage match against Montreal in what was an emotionally charged opening round from the first drop of the puck. None of that passion was evident in this one, even if Alexandre Burrows tried poking around Henrik Lundqvist’s crease whenever the opportunity presented itself. For the longest time, it might as well have been a regular-season game.
Lundqvist was far and away the Blueshirts’ best player, his 41-save performance hardly smudged by the fluky winner that went off his crown with 4:11 in regulation when Erik Karlsson’s right-corner shot from below the goal-line snaked through traffic and bounded in after glancing off Stepan.
“I’ve said before that Hanky needs to be our best player, and he was,” Stepan said. “He was phenomenal.”
Rick Nash didn’t come particularly close to matching his first-round level and indeed was unable to clear the puck at the line on the sequence when Karlsson got the winner. Kevin Hayes had another disappointing night. J.T. Miller struggled again. Jimmy Vesey had his most lackluster game of the tournament. Mika Zibanejad and Chris Kreider were largely ineffective through the first 40 minutes, though No. 20 was more visible than he was through most of the Montreal series. Stepan was unable to create. Brady Skjei struggled for much of the match.
Ryan McDonagh, who scored the Blueshirts’ lone goal on the power play, with Kreider setting a screen, played at a high level in 28:21. So did Michael Grabner, whose speed created a handful of chances, including his own first-period breakaway against Craig Anderson that missed the net. Notably, Grabner replaced Vesey for an offensive-zone draw with 2:45 remaining in the match.
The Rangers claimed they had created enough chances, but they didn’t. They didn’t make the game difficult enough for Anderson. They never were able to dictate the tempo.
“We have to be smarter and we have to be better,” said Zuccarello. “It’s the second round of the playoffs.”
It is?