Rangers come up short versus elite Western Conference foe Jets
The Jets treated Tuesday night’s matchup with the Rangers like a litmus test against their counterpart in the East.
The Rangers, on the other hand, couldn’t help but approach it for what it was: Their sixth game in nine days.
It played out on the Madison Square Garden ice accordingly, with Winnipeg capturing a 4-2 win over the Rangers to at least temporarily leapfrog the Canucks for first place in the Western Conference before Vancouver’s matchup with the Sabres later Tuesday night.
The Rangers’ loss mixed with the Hurricanes’ win over the Islanders minimized the gap between the two clubs in the Metropolitan Division to a mere two points.
And there’s this: The rest of the month isn’t getting any easier for the Blueshirts.
“I think we did a lot of the right things for 40-something minutes of that and you give up some chances that cost you and they’re a good team, too, they’re going to play hard and credit to them,” said Adam Fox, who assisted on Alexis Lafreniere’s 3-2 score late in the third period before Jets forward Mark Scheifele completed the hat trick with an empty-net goal. “I thought we battled hard. Just those 10-15 minutes [in the second period] bit us there. I think a lot of teams are playing a lot of hockey right now, we know that and we’ve dealt with these injuries all year. Obviously, it hurts, but I think you still try to go out and do the right things.”
There was apparently some buildup to this game for the Jets, who were without their head coach Rick Bowness on Tuesday due to a minor procedure.
After Winnipeg’s win over the Blue Jackets on Sunday, Bowness classified the Rangers as “the big test” and “one of, if not the top team, in the league.”
Coming off a hellish week with two sets of back-to-back games, the Rangers were seemingly still recuperating from a five-game gauntlet of an Eastern Conference swing.
Competitive contests against the Devils, Hurricanes, Lightning, Penguins and Islanders were hard to come down from, especially with the Bruins and the Panthers staring them in the face at the end of this week on Thursday and Saturday, respectively.
The Rangers fell flat in a second period that saw the Jets score three goals in comparison to the home team’s one from Alex Wennberg on the power play.
Despite holding a 16-7 edge in shots in the final frame, the Rangers could only cut the Jets’ lead to one when Lafreniere put the puck away off a block in front with 1:54 left in regulation.
There wasn’t enough time, however, for the Rangers to notch the equalizer before Scheifele notched his 22nd goal of the season on an empty net.
“Second period is not good enough,” Mika Zibanejad said. “I think we get away a little bit from our game and obviously they do a good job of being tough on us in the neutral zone. A couple bounces here and there, as well. I think the second period kind of messes the game up for us a little bit, especially with the start that we had.”
Skating without two of their top four defensemen in Jacob Trouba and Ryan Lindgren for the first time since Lindgren went down in the win over the Islanders on Sunday, the Rangers had that working against them as well.
Chad Ruhwedel made his Rangers debut alongside Zac Jones, who has been filling in since Trouba was sidelined.
The depth pieces that have helped carry the team through this tough stretch, however, weren’t as effective this time around.
That prompted Peter Laviolette to jumble his defensive pairs and some of his forward lines by the third period, which is something the Rangers head coach hasn’t done much of this season.
“Coming off the second period, I just thought we were a little bit flat, we talked about it real quick just to make a change,” Laviolette said. “Switched a couple of centermen and gave a [new] look to the third period.”
