In Manhattan, Tony DeAngelo scored 32 seconds into extra time on Monday to help the Rangers escape the Minnesota Wild, 3-2.
All three Wild skaters found themselves trapped on the left boards leaving DeAngelo a clear shot.
“Once [DeAngelo] came over the top it was a little bit of a parting of the Red Sea and he did a great job holding onto it,” Rangers coach David Quinn said. “If he would have passed it, I would have thrown up on the bench, so I’m glad he didn’t.”
Henrik Lundqvist made 26 saves in picking up his 455th NHL win, good for sole possession of fifth place in the NHL record book.
“We’ve had a couple games after good games that we’ve struggled in and that’s kind of slowed us down a bit,” DeAngelo said, “but if you’re going to make the playoffs you have to put some streaks together so hopefully this could be the start of one, especially two comebacks.”
Ryan Donato and Zach Parise scored for the Wild who were down 1-0 after the Rangers took the lead in the first period. Parise’s goal came on the Wild’s second shot of the middle frame, they had two total shots in the period.
Chris Kreider scored on the power play with under three minutes left in regulation to rescue the Rangers from an embarrassing loss.
“We talk about it all the time and it’s not inexperience, but you can’t take a penalty every game in the last five minutes,” Wild coach Bruce Boudreau said. “It just is sort of sitting there and saying, ‘Here, team, we’re going to give you a great opportunity to score.’ They seem to do it.”
Brady Skjei scored in the opening period to give the Rangers the 1-0 lead.
“You can just feel us growing as a team. If you’re going to have success you need togetherness,” Quinn said. “Just because you’re wearing the same jersey doesn’t mean you’re a team. One of the things I think we’ve done a much better job of over the last few weeks is starting to understand what it’s going to have to take for us to have success. You can just feel it.”
Artemi Panarin assisted all three Rangers goals.
[WATCH: All Wild vs. Rangers highlights]
Alex Stalock made 28 saves in the loss.
“Man, we’ve got to finish a game off,” Stalock said. “Bad bounce on a shot that’s maybe going wide, hits a skate and goes right to the guy. That’s kind of the way the bounces have been going the last two [games].”
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