The Rangers closed out their regular season schedule for 2015-16 Saturday afternoon at Madison Square Garden with a 3-2 victory over the Detroit Red Wings. The win gave the Blueshirts 101 points on the season, their second straight 100-point campaign and the ninth time in franchise history the Rangers reached 100 points.
The victory puts the Rangers two points up on the Islanders for third place in the Metropolitan Division. The Isles have games Saturday and Sunday nights and they would need three of a possible four points to finish third since the Rangers own the tiebreaker against them. A third-place finish means a first-round playoff date with the Pittsburgh Penguins, while the other club would match up against the Florida Panthers.
“We were playing to win,” explained defenseman Marc Staal. “We are not scared of anybody. We’re a good team that knows how to win. You play the game to win. When you start going out of your way not to do that it’s bad hockey karma. You don’t lose to play somebody else.”
Kevin Hayes tipped a Dylan McIlrath shot into the Red Wings net with 5:38 remaining in regulation, snapping a 1-1 tie and giving New York its second lead of the afternoon. It was his 14th goal of the season, while McIlrath picked up his fourth point–and second assist–of his rookie season.
“It was definitely an up and down season,” said Hayes in the post-game dressing room. “Now it’s seven games against the same team and nothing really matters from the regular season. Playoffs are a whole new page.”
Oscar Lindberg, who also assisted on the Hayes goal, scored into an empty net at 17:24 to make it 3-1 Rangers. However Justin Abdelkader scored for Detroit with 1:34 left on the clock and the goaltender pulled for an extra attacker to make it 3-2.
Then the Rangers took back to back penalties–at 18:47 and 19:40–but managed to kill off what was a 6-on-3 Detroit power play with the extra attacker also on the ice. The final clear out of the Rangers zone was off the stick of rookie defenseman Brady Skjei, who played 22:04 and was a +2 on Saturday.
Antti Raanta backstopped the win for New York, finishing with 31 saves, including 15 in the second period. Henrik Lundqvist’s back up finished off a solid first season in New York with an 11-6-2 record over 25 appearances.
“For me it was a big win,” explained Raanta, who was named the game’s No. 1 Star. “You know the other team is playing for their (playoff) life, and we kind of already knew (we were in the playoffs)…so it was nice to get the two points in the last regular season game.”
It had appeared that the Red Wings had scored the game’s first goal just 2:42 into play when Detroit’s Joakim Andersson banged a loose puck into the net, but the on-ice call was overturned when Alain Vigneault used his coach’s challenge and it was correctly determined that the play was offsides.
Instead of trailing by a goal, the Rangers wound up scoring first when Dan Boyle netted his tenth of the season with 3:26 to play in the first period. The 39 year-old veteran wheeled out of his own end of the ice with the puck and took off on a two-on-one with teammate Derick Brassard. Boyle ended up snapping a right-wing shot stick side past Red Wings goalie Jimmy Howard to give the Blueshirts the 1-0 lead.
Chris Kreider, who assisted on the goal, retrieved the puck for Boyle, who quite possibly was playing the final regular season game of his National Hockey League career. If indeed that was the case, it will be a special memory for Boyle who has scored 163 goals and totaled 606 points over 1093 career games with the Rangers, Sharks, Lightning and Panthers.
Detroit largely outplayed New York in the second period, outshooting the Rangers 16-7, and pulled even at 6:42 on a Riley Sheahan power play goal. Pavel Datsyuk wristed a shot towards the net where Sheahan was battling New York defenseman Dylan McIlrath for position and the puck deflected off Sheahan before bouncing off the blocker of Raanta and into the net, tying the score, 1-1.
Raanta was excellent in keeping the game even to the second intermission, making huge stops on a Tomas Tatar break in and a slick Dylan Larkin redirection, among others in the middle twenty. At the other end of the rink Howard did his part with a sharp right pad stop after Rick Nash had burst past the Red Wings defense.
“Antti played a really good game,” stated Vigneault. “There wasn’t a whole lot there in the first period, but they had a strong second (period), and he was good.”
Shortly before the period ended the Rangers, who were already playing without four regulars in the lineup–Ryan McDonagh, Dan Girardi, Mats Zuccarello, and Viktor Stalberg–saw Eric Staal lay in a heap at the left wing dot in the Detroit zone after he was accidentally hit up high in the head area by teammate Jesper Fast, who struck the kneeling Staal while chasing down a loose puck.
Staal eventually was helped off the ice and to the Rangers dressing room and did not return to the game. However after the contest Vigneault said that Staal was held out of the remainder of the game as a precaution and added, “He should be fine.”
“You don’t want to see anyone get hurt,” offered Hayes, Staal’s linemate. “Eric’s been a huge help to me, and he’s a great guy. You don’t want to see him go down like that, but I hope he’s OK.”
Vigneault stated that he expects Girardi, Zuccarello and Stalberg also to be ready to play next week when the post-season gets underway.
“We’ll take a few days to get ready for our next opponent and then it’s time to win more hockey games,” concluded Raanta.
Jim Cerny
BlueshirtsUnited.com
(Reprinted with permission of the New York Rangers)
