RETURN OF THE KING!
Hank shakes off ‘dirty headshot,’ shuts out Stars
DALLAS — In a sense this was a return to normalcy, Henrik Lundqvist returning to his throne, but it also was far from a normal night for The King. This wasn’t a usual regular-season contest after he had nine days and four games on the bench to consider his game and a situation in which backup Antti Raanta was simply too good to not play.
And after wanting so badly to be back on the ice — boom, Lundqvist was blindsided, blasted by a high, dirty hit by Dallas’ Cody Eakin in the first period. Extremely dangerous, not normal, and yet Lundqvist was undeterred, returning after missing 5:31 to be examined and stopping all 27 shots to lead the Rangers to a 2-0 shutout of the Stars.
“I went out there with a lot of desperation in my approach,” said Lundqvist, whose shutout was his second of the season and 61st of his career. “I felt like it was an important game for me to just feel good. My game hasn’t changed over a week, but my mindset obviously had changed a little bit with everything that’s been going on. It was a new experience for me.”
Lundqvist was playing the puck in the trapezoid during a Rangers power play before Eakin trucked through the goaltender, sending him down to the ice and his helmet flying on a hit that Marc Staal told the Daily News was “a dirty headshot.” Eakin made no attempt to avoid Lundqvist as he skated toward him. Lundqvist left the game at 9:19 before returning at 14:50 of the first period. “The league better do something about that hit,” Alain Vigneault said. “It’s everything that you want to take away from the game: hit to the head, forward motion — and it’s a goaltender on top. If that happens in the playoffs and your goaltender’s got to go out of the net, they better do something about that.” The unnecessary, suspension-worthy hit didn’t rattle Lundqvist, who said his neck and shoulder were sore. He made 18 saves in the second period before only needing to make three in the third, when Rick Nash created his own shorthanded opportunity and buried his 12th goal of the season at 7:08 of the third before Mats Zuccarello’s empty-netter with 1:04 left.
Nash, who missed the previous four games with a groin injury, wasn’t at all surprised by Lundqvist’s performance.
“I don’t want to say we expect it from him, but he’s our best player and he’s one of the best goalies in the world,” Nash said.
The start of the game felt weird, Lundqvist said, after the time off.
He said he had started to miss the game over the last week, one which was encapsulated by his chat with a doctor while being checked out after the vicious hit.
“The doctor asked me if I’m OK: ‘I don’t know about this last week,’ ” Lundqvist said. “That was my answer, but other than that I feel pretty good.”
ISLANDERS, DEVILS LOSE
Richard Panik scored the tiebreaking goal with 6:13 left in the third period to lift the Chicago Blackhawks over the Islanders, 5-4.
l Vladimir Tarasenko had a goal and two assists and Alex Pietrangelo scored the goahead goal as the St. Louis Blues beat the Devils, 5-2.