Rangers latest victim for Vegas heading into bye

LAS VEGAS — Just because it was better doesn’t mean it was good. And now the Rangers have a whole week to think about it.

In the final game before their f ive-day bye week, and in the first trip here to face the Golden Knights, the Rangers were subpar for the second straight night, this time suffering a 2-1 loss Sunday night at T-Mobile Arena.

Following up a 2-1 shootout win in Arizona on Saturday that almost solely was on the back of Henrik Lundqvist, coach Alain Vigneault decided to turn to his backup, Ondrej Pavelec, and mix things up by scratching his third-leading scorer, Pavel Buchnevich, as well as veteran defenseman Brendan Smith. He also lost integral center Kevin Hayes after the first period due to a “lower-body” injury, the severity of which still was being determined after the game.

But still the Rangers head into the break with the lasting image of them turning the puck over with alarming regularity and losing far more one-on-one battles than they’re winning.

“Some of the turnovers are wanting to do a little too much,” said Mika Zibanejad, who was the only Ranger to beat a terrific Marc-Andre Fleury, giving his team a 1-0 lead at 13:05 of the f irst period. “At times, that’s a little bit of a confidence thing, as well. You might not want the puck as much.”

Now passed the halfway mark of the season, the Rangers (2215-5) understand just exactly what works for them and what doesn’t. And they got by against the league-worst Coyotes, but the Western Conference-leading Golden Knights (29-10-2) made them pay with the game-winner coming from William Karlsson at 8:58 of the third period, a tictac-toe play the Blueshirts just couldn’t pick up.

“We lost the game that we wanted to win before the break,” said Pavelec, who was solid in making 32 saves, the only other blemish besides Karlsson being a sniper shot from James Neal at 17:23 of the f irst that tied the game, 1-1 . “We played back-toback, it wasn’t easy. And we can’t be happy because we lost.”

The Blueshirts did get winger Mats Zuccarello back after he missed Saturday’s game with an illness, but he looked sluggish — as did most of the team. It took them until after Karlsson’s goal, almost 50 minutes into the game, to get any sustained offensive pressure.

But that’s when Fleury made the saves that ignited the already raucous sold-out crowd of 18,234, stopping Paul Carey and Brady Skjei from in close in the f inal f ive minutes to preserve the lead and send the Rangers home for the week with a lot of things to f igure out.

“We know how to play when we’re playing good,” Zibanejad said. “We just have to clean up some pieces.”