AV must alter lines ‘2’ provide a spark

OTTAWA — It is one game, but it is also seven. Though Alain Vigneault won’t overreact to the Rangers’ sleepy and sloppy performance in Thursday’s 2-1 defeat to the Senators in Game 1 of Round 2 because that is simply not his way, it is incumbent upon the coach to find the way to jump-start a handful of key forwards who essentially have been MIA since the tournament commenced. That includes Chris Kreider, J.T. Miller, Kevin Hayes and Derek Stepan, who combined for 84 goals during the regular season, but have amassed the loneliest number of one goal in the playoffs: the Stepan empty-netter that sealed the series win over Montreal. Beyond that, the Rangers have scored one evenstrength goal the past two games and three over the past three games. Whereas Ottawa forced Henrik Lundqvist to be at his best, the Rangers put no such Game 1 onus on Craig Anderson, who never was shaken out of a comfort zone. “Without singling [Stepan] out, a lot of players in our group have to be better,” Vigneault said. “We need to be better. Our guys need to be better.” And when asked whether one game could be enough to prompt him to make changes, the coach responded, “Yes … yes … it depends how you feel certain guys put out. “As a coach, you’re always looking to put your best lineup on the table.” Vigneault shook up his lines and changed his personnel in response to the Blueshirts’ desultory performance in their Game 3 loss to the Canadiens. The Rangers presented a more dangerous and diversified attack after the coach switched out Tanner Glass for Pavel Buchnevich and juggled his line combinations. Now, with Game 2 looming Saturday afternoon against an Ottawa team that seems to be enjoying what must be an inside joke about the Blueshirts being so powerful that avoiding a sweep was uppermost on the Senators’ minds entering Game 1, it is on Vigneault again to get his stagnant team moving in the right direction.

It is time to break up the Hayes-Miller combination that served each player so well, at least from an offensive standpoint, throughout most of the past two regular seasons. Both seem to be caught in postseason ruts. Miller’s dynamic and instinctive game has been almost thoroughly muted. Hayes, who did make a key pass (after Miller had won the puck) to set up Mats Zuccarello for the series winner in Game 6 against Montreal, has been passive.

Stepan is generally on against the opposition’s top centers, so heavy lifting on the other side of the puck can at times offset disappointing production. But let’s face it, Montreal’s Phillip Danault and Tomas Plekanec hardly represented a murderer’s row down the middle. And let’s face it, though Derick Brassard, Kyle Turris and Jean-Gabriel Pageau can be a handful, they’re not exactly Steve Yzerman, Sergei Fedorov and Keith Primeau, either.

I’d like to see Vigneault switch to a unit with Stepan between Miller and Rick Nash, who had his poorest game of the postseason on Thursday, on the right. Miller’s best postseason performance of his career came while playing on a unit with Nash and Brassard in four-point (1-3) Game 6 of the Tampa Bay conference finals in 2015. When Nash is going, he lifts his linemates. Miller most certainly needs one. So does Stepan.

Zuccarello, quiet himself in Game 1, needs to skate with a center who is going to deliver him the puck here and there. If Hayes can’t do a better job than he has been doing, perhaps it is time to reunite the Kreider-Mika Zibanejad-Zuccarello unit that was intact for a dozen games immediately following No. 93’s return from his broken fibula.

And Vigneault needs to find more ice time for Oscar Lindberg and Jesper Fast, who had another effective night individually and in tandem Thursday despite comparatively limited ice. Fast gets extra time killing penalties, as does Michael Grabner, the third member of the nominal fourth line. But Lindberg gets neither shorthanded nor power-play time. As such, he is often skipped in the rotation following a kill or a man-advantage. The fact is, Lindberg had only 14 shifts on Thursday, whereas Hayes had 25. That is an imbalance that should be addressed if Hayes doesn’t pick it up.

Thursday was only one game. But time runs out quickly in the postseason. And while there is no cause for overreaction, the time is now for the Rangers and Vigneault to act.