No defense for Blueshirts’ third straight defeat

DETROIT — The Rangers have lost three games in a row for the first time since November.

After giving up the first goal for the fifth straight game, the Rangers managed to tie the score early in the second period before the Red Wings powered ahead to hand the visitors a 4-1 loss at Little Caesars Arena on Thursday night.

It’s just the fourth time this season the Rangers have lost three straight games.

“It’s not the end of the world, but we’re starting to get kind of to the stretch run here,” Jimmy Vesey told The Post after the loss. “We want to feel good about our game. … Got to find a way to get back in the win column.”

The Rangers announced, before the game, that Vitali Kravtsov and Jake Leschyshyn were unavailable due to “roster management reasons.” As a result, head coach Gerard Gallant had to play with 11 forwards and seven defensemen.

Defenseman Ben Harpur dressed for the first time in six games. He had been a healthy scratch since the Rangers acquired blueliner Niko Mikkola as part of the deal with the Blues that brought Vladimir Tarasenko to New York on Feb. 9. Despite taking line rushes during warm-ups as a forward, Harpur skated as a defenseman and logged 2:50 of ice time.

Kravtsov hasn’t played since Feb. 10, and has been a healthy scratch in 11 of the last 12 games, but Leschyshyn had been the Rangers’ fourth-line center for the previous five games and 13 of the last 14 games since getting picked up off waivers on Jan. 11.

After former Ranger Andrew Copp opened the scoring on the rush early in the first period, Vincent Trocheck made it a 1-1 game by taking the shot himself on a twoon-one rush alongside Alexis Lafreniere at 6:06 of the second period.

Tyler Motte then turned the puck over at the blue line, leading to Filip Zadina’s go-ahead goal barely two minutes after the Rangers had tied it.

Defensive lapses continued to plague the Rangers. The defensive coverage was loose, as it had been in the past few games. Players continued to find themselves out of position, forcing them to reach for the puck and either get called for a penalty or get beat. The Rangers outshot their opponents, this time 31-23, for the second straight game.

Since they aren’t scoring, however, the Rangers have been crippled by how many goals they have given up.

“Not good enough,” Gallant said. “We didn’t play hard enough for 60 minutes. You know, what bothered me about it is some of those goals they scored on the rush. We had bad reads on the rush and that left them wide open. Two of the goals were unnecessary goals for me.”