In New York, Matt Rempe snapped a scoreless tie at 4:17 of the middle frame, to give the Rangers a 1-0 lead over the Washington Capitals on Sunday afternoon.
For Rempe, it was his fist career Stanley Cup Playoff goal.
“I’ll always remember it. It was awesome,” Rempe said. “It didn’t really kick in and then you hear the crowd. It was a dream come true. It was unreal. … I know my game. I know I can skate well and be physical. I’m built for the playoffs, I think. … I was happy with how tonight went.”
The Rangers added two more goals in a span of 126 seconds for a 3-0 lead en route to a 4-1 win over the Caps in Game 1 of their Stanley Cup Playoffs first round series.
Rempe was set up in front of the net off a pass from Jimmy Vesey for the goal. Barclay Goodrow, also of the fourth line, added the secondary assist on the play. He had two assists in the win.
“I think any game he’s in the lineup, he’s had an effect on the game,” Vesey said of Rempe. “I think it’s been fun playing with him. He shows up every night for the team and it’s great to see him get that goal. It was a big goal in the game, obviously, but the look on his face was pretty cool too.”
The second goal came at 4:50 of the period with Alexis Lafreniere getting a takeaway along the left boards in the defensive zone and sending the puck to Vincent Trocheck who sent it on to Artemi Panarin for a quick wrister for a 2-0 lead.
Vesey finished the outburst at 6:23 with a wrist shot off the face off, scoring from the edge of the right circle for a 3-0 advantage.
“They’ve been good for us all year and it was big for them to play as well as they did tonight, score a couple goals for us,” the Rangers’ Jacob Trouba said. “I think we have really good depth throughout our lineup and each line can score goals and defend and play solid hockey. That’s the strength of our team, so I don’t think anybody in here is surprised by that.”
Igor Shesterkin made 20 saves in the win.
Game 2 is set for Tuesday in New York.
“The first period was OK,” the Capitals’ Alex Ovechkin said. “The second period, a couple mistakes and they score goals, but we all understand it’s a playoff game. Everybody has to play much better, so forget about this one and move forward.”
Martin Fehervary was the lone striker for the Capitals. His goal at 7:30 of the second period stopped the Rangers run to close the gap to 3-1.
The Rangers held the Caps to just six shots on goal in the third period.
“It makes the game pretty easy when everyone’s going like that,” New York’s K’Andre Miller said. “I think we had our foot on the pedal all night and made it really hard on their defenseman, didn’t give them much. ”
In the third period, Jack Roslovic picked up an errant puck in the defensive zone and tapped it to Mika Zibanejad who found a streaking Chris Kreider down the middle ice. His pass hit Kreider in stride who broke in, uncontested, for a backhand shot and a 4-1 final count on the scoreboard.
“They’ve obviously got very good special teams over there and to shut them down on the PK was big momentum for us,” Carlson said. “We had plenty of chances to grab it through those kills, through the power plays, but when you let it blow in the wind, you never know what’s going to happen.”
Charlie Lindgren made 27 saves in the loss.
“They’re opportunistic. They’re a good team,” the Capitals’ John Carlson said. “We know they’re going to be able to bury chances. We know we can’t be giving them 2-on-1s in the middle of the ice and stuff like that. It’s nothing we didn’t expect, nothing we haven’t talked about. We have a chance to play a lot better and I think for us just regroup and put our heads down and get back to work like we always have.”
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