Game 4: Penguins 5, Rangers 0.
Click here for the boxscore with links to the official game summary, etc.
Thoughts:
1) Heave Ho, three in a row? As in three straight wins? As in three straight years coming back from 3-1 down?
2) Not bloody likely, especially since this is the only team in history to do that two years in a row.
3) But this Rangers team ain’t those teams. This team is wildly, at times embarrassingly, inconsistent, in its performance and its effort, in its willingness to compete, willingness to defend. It is lacking in so many areas, most apparently its special teams … Compared to the penalty kill, the power play looks spectacular. And this Penguins team, ain’t that 2014 team.
4) And, hey, I believed before this series that their only shot in hell was for Henrik Lundqvist to play out of his mind. He most certainly has not. Not even close. The guys in front of him were as bad, many of them much worse. But if he’s not sharp as he can be, there’s no hope at all. Four goals on 18 shots, and a trip to the bench in the second period is shocking.
5) Not that I believe it could happen again, but this is the exact same Game 4 that they played vs. Pittsburgh in 2014. Same feel. That time Rick Nash, Brad Richards and Martin St. Louis were booed off the ice. That time Richards was saying it was the worst game he ever played. St. Louis had the deer-in-the-headlights look. That team was done. Dead in the water. But that team found an emotional tipping point in the passing of France St. Louis. I also picked Pittsburgh in 5 for that series, if I recall correctly.
6) That team was different. That team took off around Christmas and was really good for a long stretch. This team had its games during the season, especially against some of the better teams, but this team stunk a whole lot of nights. Took nights off. Executed poorly. Didn’t appear prepared some nights. Rarely questioned a poor game, sticking with the “we did a lot of good things” theme. Came wobbling into the playoffs to play a team that is now 17-3 in its last 20, one of the losses a throw-away on the final weekend when everybody was rested. This Rangers team will knock me off my chair if it even gets to a Game 6. (In case you went to bed at a normal hour, the NHL announced at 1:35 a.m. that Game 5, Rangers-Penguins, is a 3 p.m. start Saturday; as if they couldn’t have said, if this, then this?).
7) Game 6 would be at home, where your New York Rangers have proudly scored one goal in the last 13 playoff periods in front of that pathetic crowd – maybe worst in the league – at MSG. None of those goals at even strength or on the power play – only Rick Nash’s short-hander on Tuesday in Game 3. Where they have lost five straight playoff games since Game 1 of the Eastern Final vs. Tampa Bay, outscored 18-3.
8) Crazy thing is, I still believe the Rangers are the third best team in the pathetic East. But because they didn’t tank, two of the best three teams will be eliminated in the first two rounds. And a team worse than the Rangers will play in the Eastern Final. Maybe the Fish Tanks.
9) Well, at least the Rangers have home-ice advantage. What? They don’t? But all the TV and radio guys and a lot of web sites were saying they had home-ice advantage after they won Game 2? Did the schedule change? What happened? (By my calculations, home teams through Thursday’s games, are 15-19. Big advantage).
10) Also, we’ve seen a lot of momentum from game to game in these eight first-round series, haven’t we? Yup, sure have.
11) By the way, that thing I said about Ryan McDonagh’s return meaning more to the Rangers than Evgeni Malkin’s return meant to the Penguins. Never mind. I mean, I thought McDonagh was pretty good in both games with whatever percentage of his right hand he is using. But Malkin=Monster in this game. Scoring two, assisting on two, drawing the penalties for the two PPGs. Talk about will and execution. Where do the Rangers get some of that?
12) In the third, Malkin was slashed by J.T. Miller, and I’m not sure if it was the arm that the Rangers believed was broken, but he was hurting and went to the bench for some of that freezing spray. And on the resulting power play, got his second goal and fourth point, in between Nash and Kevin Klein. Malkin seemed to really enjoy that one. That was the Penguins’ seventh power-play goal in the series, to the Rangers’ one, which was scored on a two-man advantage. OMG.
13) Until the Rangers just abandoned everything defensively, when the Mercy Rule should have been invoked, and the Penguins napped in their neutral-zone trap, I thought rookie second-stringer Matt Murray made one single difficult save, when he exploded across the goalmouth to stop Eric Staal. I think I sweated more during the game than he did.
14) And more than some of the Rangers did. If you wrote down the names of all the players, 40-whatever who have played in this series, in order of how they’ve played, how many of the top 10 would be Rangers? How many of the top 20? Would Big Game Brass be in the top 30? 40?
15) Right off the bat, the place was pretty jacked, John Amirante doing his double-fist-pump “Bombs bursting in air…” For the second time in the series, Chris Kreider jousted off the opening faceoff with Patric Hornqvist, who really is under their collective skin, then Klein buried Kris “no apology, it was an accident” Letang.
16) But Alain Vigneault, who played a little gamesmanship with his lineup and his lines, and made only one personnel change, trotted out a brand new line – Eric Staal between Miller and Viktor Stalberg, with Keith Yandle and Dan Boyle, who he apparently considered scratching. Epic fail. Eric Fehr got in behind Miller and Boyle to bury Ben Lovejoy’s rebound … 1-0 at 1:09. Exactly what you want in that situation.
17) This series has featured some of the worst officiating – not even going to discuss the NHLDPS again – you could possibly find for four games. Just awful. And it really hasn’t had a bearing on the series, especially since the Rangers’ power play looks now the way it did when Penguins coach Smilin’ Mike Sullivan was running it.
18) But I found it comical some of the stuff that went on, again. Like Letang pulled down Jesper Fast from behind, with his stick, the referee looking right at it, shaking his head. Maybe it was stuck in Fast’s stickblade, but Letang most certainly gave it a nice yank. Play on. Nash backed into Trevor Daley in front and was tagged for interference. I mean, technically, maybe that’s interference. So battling for space in front of the net is now illegal? Is there a chance in the world that any referee makes that call again in these playoffs?
19) I have no idea what the officials could have possibly been thinking when Chris Kunitz blasted Marc Staal from behind in the crease, then knocked the net off its pegs for no apparent reason. Kunitz went directly to the penalty box, only to have the referees tell him there’s no penalty. OMG. What has to happen?
20) And irony of all ironies, Tanner Glass’s stick accidentally rides up and cuts Matt Cullen. Double minor is the correct call, 100 percent. But seriously, they saw that one, but didn’t see the one that cost Stalberg three teeth in Game 3? You know, the one the NHLDPS ruled, reportedly, to have been accidental? What a crock that was. Then Letang claimed he apologized to Stalberg, and Stalberg said he didn’t. So there’s that. Which is nice.
21) So on the PP on the Nash call, Letang to Malkin, 55-footer, Crosby with an all-world high-slot deflection, puck changing direction by five feet, then hit Hornqvist and went in. 2-0. Lundqvist gets a complete pass on that one, IMO.
22) The Rangers got two PPs in a row, barely got a scoring chance. Not a single shot on the first one. MSG fans booing, of course. When they weren’t texting. Or ordering food. Or jumping up and down for a T-shirt toss. … What ever happened to the diehards who released the red, white and blue balloons before every playoff game?
23) Kevin Klein coughed one up to Conor Sheary for a clean breakaway and a short-side wrister that may have glanced off Lundqvist’s blocker. Absolutely has to stop that one. Backbreaker. Not that it ultimately would have mattered.
24) Oh, and 23 seconds after the breakaway goal, there was Malkin, with two assists already, putting a wrap-around into the net, though it was wiped out because McDonagh and Chris Kunitz were in Lundqvist’s grill.
25) So 4:00 into the second, Dominic Moore in the box for a legit penalty against Malkin, Crosby beats the Rangers behind the net, just a great play, throws it out to Malkin for a 45-footer through Marc Staal’s screen (and if it wasn’t a screen, that’s an awful goal for Lundqvist to allow). 4-0.
26) Some stuff from the lockerroom … Alain Vigneault: “It’s definitely out of character for this group to come up with this type of performance. I don’t think it was lack of will, we just picked a very bad night to have a very bad game. Right now, all we can focus on is getting back to work tomorrow and that’s what we’re going to do. …“This is definitely a team loss. I am not going to single out one individual. As a whole group, we had a hard time and the results went accordingly.”
27) Ryan McDonagh: “At this point, there is no reason or point to try and describe what happened. We weren’t ourselves out there. We weren’t playing up to our potential and the way that’s necessary for us to have a chance to win a game, but it’s behind us. [There’s] nothing we can do about it now. We learn from it, we’ll watch tape, we’ll continue to prepare like we normally do. Obviously we know what our situation is, our season’s on the line here. We have to believe in each other in the room. That’s all it takes. No one is going to get out of this hole that we’ve created but the guys in the room, so that has to be our focus. Everyone has to prepare as best as they can to go out and play to their strength as best as they can to help us win a game.”
28) More McDonagh, who said that the goal is “to win a Stanley Cup here. It’s never a good feeling when you lose a game and they’re taking away your opportunities out there, trying to win a Cup. There’s no point in trying to break it down right now. It’s tough after a game. We’ve got to put it behind us real quick here, refocus and get ready to go out and execute better.”
29) Henrik Lundqvist: “I’m not going to analyze it too much – I’m just going to say I was not good enough. It was just a really bad game. I need to be better, simple as that. I don’t need to say more than that. … “It’s disappointing, there’s no question. All we can do now is go to Pittsburgh with a mindset that we have to win that game or the season is over. We just have to man up to the situation here and realize that this was not good enough. We are playing a really good team. Obviously it’s my job to be there when we have breakdowns but I was not good enough today.”
30) Most coaches, in a desperate situation like this, make lineup changes. Not sure what else Vigneault can do now. I mean, I’d be shocked if he started Antti Raanta. Does he go Raphael Diaz or Dylan McIlrath (doubtful) for Dan Boyle, who could be playing his final NHL game, if he hasn’t already? Does that really change anything? Maybe it helps the power play, but that’s a prayer. Kevin Hayes back in? Please.
31) Most of all, these Rangers will kick themselves, perhaps subconsciously, for doing the right thing and not tanking Game 82 vs. Detroit.
32) Speaking of which, has anybody at all figured out what Gerard Gallant challenged on the disallowed Jonathan Huberdeau goal against the Fish Tanks in Game 4? The goal, on which Huberdeau slid into goalie Thomas Greiss, was disallowed. It was, of course, reviewed by the Situation Room, and the ruling on ice was upheld. No goal (I didn’t necessarily agree with it). Then Gallant challenged. There are only two things a coach can challenge, whether the play was off-side, or whether there was goalie interference. That’s my understanding of the rule. If so, Gallant was challenging that HIS guy interfered with Greiss? Which would have disallowed the goal a third time? Does he not know the rules? Or am I wrong?
33) How about the Fish Tanks fans who doused Denis Potvin with beer at the end of Game 4 (they also splashed Kenny Albert, which makes me want to go to Brooklyn and fight somebody). What a freakin’ embarrassment. Denis Potvin, whatever kind of guy anybody thinks he is, ought to be a God to Islanders fans. Ought to be their Mark Messier. Disgraceful.
34) In my column yesterday I mentioned one-time NHL VP Brian O’Neill, the former head of discipline in the glorious John Ziegler regime. These were the days where a guy like O’Neill or Ziegler (or Ed Snider) were always called “Mr.” So one day O’Neill suspended one of the Flyers, and I apologize because I don’t remember if it was Glen Cochrane or Darryl Stanley or some other orange and black prehistoric cretin. Anyway, one of the Philly writers goes to the player for a comment, and the player spits out, “Mr. O’Neill is out to lunch.” That was pretty blasphemous in the 1980s. So the writer calls O’Neill’s office for a reaction, and he gets the secretary who says, “I’m sorry, Mr. O’Neill is out to lunch.”
35) I really thought the Empire State Building would be lit up in purple last night. Thought it would be a slam dunk. It wasn’t.
36) All the Lundqvist-hating, Talbot-crush fanboys must feel like it’s Christmas morning under the tree right now. Funny thing is, if they ever met Lundqvist it would be “oooh, oooh, Mr. Lundqvist, could you please sign my shirt and take a picture with me, sir?” Frauds.
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My Three Rangers Stars:
1. Chris Kreider.
2. Ryan McDonagh.
3. Mats Zuccarello.
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Your poll vote for Three Rangers Stars:
1. Brady Skjei.
2. tie, Antti Raanta.
2. tie, Eric Staal.
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