Struggling Rangers Face Difficult Challenge in Penguins
GREENBURGH, N.Y. - The Rangers should be fattening up ahead of Christmas, feasting on a steady diet of home games. Instead, they are victory-starved and face Sidney Crosby and the Eastern Conference-leading Pittsburgh Penguins on Wednesday night at Madison Square Garden.
'What I'm trying right now is to find duos or lines that have some chemistry,' Coach Alain Vigneault said after practice Tuesday. 'If I can find lines that perform consistently offensively and defensively, I'll do that.'
On Sunday night, the Rangers snapped a four-game losing streak by beating Calgary, 4-3. But that victory came in a shootout against a Flames team ranked 13th among the Western Conference's 14 teams.
It did little to ease the sense of decline that is starting to dominate the discussion around the 16-17-1 Rangers. The team that finished first in the East and went to the conference finals two seasons ago under the prickly John Tortorella has lost focus under the hands-off approach of the cool-tempered Vigneault. The dedication to defense and close checking of past years is gone, forcing goalie Henrik Lundqvist to confront wave after wave of odd-man rushes. All unrestricted free agents, including Dan Girardi and the captain, Ryan Callahan, are expendable to a rebuilding program.
'It's hard to figure why we haven't played well lately,' said Derek Stepan, who scored his first goal in 11 games in the victory over Calgary. 'No one wants to win more than the people in this room. It can be a goofy sport.'
Goofy, perhaps, but right now, the current state of the Rangers is grim.
Since they crushed the Vancouver Canucks, 5-2, on Nov. 30 in Tortorella's highly anticipated return to New York, the Rangers are 2-4-1. Tortorella's Canucks have gone 7-0.
Since signing a seven-year, $59.5 million contract extension with the Rangers, Lundqvist is 2-3-1 with a poor .893 save percentage. Excluding the first game after he re-signed against the dismal Buffalo Sabres, Lundqvist is 1-3-1 with an .857 percentage.
Lundqvist's 1-3-1 record is also the Rangers' mark in the last five games, all at home, at the start of a club-record nine-game homestand.
The Rangers are 3-10 this season against clubs over .500, which might not inspire a lot of confidence going into a game against the 24-10-1 Penguins. But the Rangers played what might have been their best game of the season in beating Pittsburgh at the Garden, 5-1, on Nov. 6. It was a highlight of a stretch during which the Rangers won seven of 10 after a demoralizing nine-game trip to start the season. But the Rangers were unable to sustain that level of play.
The Rangers were without the injured Rick Nash for the Nov. 6 game, and two key players will miss Wednesday's game with injuries. Marc Staal did not practice again Tuesday because of a concussion he sustained Dec. 7 against the Devils. Callahan is also out after sustaining a strained knee ligament Dec. 10 against Nashville that will sideline him at least four weeks.
The Penguins of Nov. 6 were almost at full strength; the Penguins who arrive at the Garden on Wednesday are decimated by injuries.
Yet they won, 3-1, in Toronto on Monday, despite playing without 10 regulars, including Evgeni Malkin, James Neal and their four top defensemen, Kris Letang, Brooks Orpik, Paul Martin and Rob Scuderi.
The Penguins' injuries enabled defenseman Philip Samuelsson, 22, to make his N.H.L. debut Monday. His father, the Rangers assistant Ulf Samuelsson, flew to Pittsburgh to see his son play and said it was 'a pretty cool feeling watching him get a few strides in.'
Samuelsson, a defenseman with the Rangers, the Penguins and other N.H.L. teams from 1985 to 2000, was asked how it would be to coach against one of his sons on Wednesday night.
'Well, I coached with a son in Sweden,' Samuelsson said, referring to his younger son, Henrik. 'I think that's worse than coaching against. But I'm sure I'll throw the odd glimpse on the ice if he plays tomorrow.'
Post a Comment for "Struggling Rangers Face Difficult Challenge in Penguins"