With the standard of officiating having changed since the postseason started and lacking consistency from game-to-game — mixed in with some outright erroneous penalty calls — Rangers coach Alain Vigneault decided it wise to take the high road.
After Tuesday’s practice, with his team preparing for Game 7 of its second-round series against the Capitals on Wednesday night at the Garden, Vigneault was asked about the increased holding and interference that has gone uncalled, and if he had to change anything to deal with it.
“I haven’t noticed any of that,” he said with a tight smile.
“We just have to play, and that’s what we’re trying to do, we’re just trying to play.”
With 2:44 remaining in Game 6, the Rangers barely clinging to a 4-3 lead, linesman Derek Amell ruled a clearing attempt from James Sheppard had cleanly gone over the glass, necessitating a delay-of-game penalty. The puck was shown to have nicked the glass on its way out of play, but the Capitals were awarded the power play nonetheless.
With three seconds remaining in the first period of that game, Washington forward Troy Brouwer was called for roughing after he pulled Carl Hagelin’s helmet off his head, and the Rangers scored with 0.3 remaining to take a 2-0 lead. Hagelin did retaliate with a similar roughing call of his own early in the second, which is uncharacteristic of the speedy Swede.
“I pride myself on drawing penalties,” Hagelin said Tuesday. “So guys can come down on me as much as they want, and I’ll try not to do anything.”
Ryan McDonagh confirmed he will play in Game 7 after taking a monstrous hit from Alex Ovechkin near the end of Game 6.
“I feel good, no issues at all,” the captain said.
McDonagh had been down the ice, stopping play, then went to the dressing room for a short while before returning to finish the game.
“I just wanted to make sure everything was solid there, mostly to catch my wind a little bit,” he said. “[My wind] got knocked out a little there.”
As far as what Vigneault saw from McDonagh in practice, the coach said: “No different than yesterday, or the day before.”
The Rangers are 9-0 in elimination games at the Garden since 2008, going 5-0 in Game 7s, and Vigneault said he thinks there is one big advantage to being home.
“One thing about home ice that might be a slight advantage is that you have last change,” he said, meaning he gets to see what players his counterpart, Barry Trotz, is putting on the ice first so he can match up accordingly.
As far as if this series has been a lot about matchups — especially against the Capitals’ top line of Ovechkin-Nicklas Backstrom-Joel Ward — Vigneault said at this point in the series, it didn’t matter much.
“Right now, I would say there are no secrets between both teams,” Vigneault said.
“We’ve played six tight games. Whichever team is going to go out and make more plays is probably the team that’s going to win.”