For much of the early campaign, the New York Rangers overpowered their opposition in a barrage of offense.
Goalie Henrik Lundqvist (#30) – file photo by Lewis Bleiman
Under the shine of the goals was a stingy defense that went mostly unnoticed.
As the offense has settled back the defense has had an opportunity to shine and Saturday night it came to the fore again.
Henrik Lundqvist made 31 saves in a 2-1 shootout win over the Predators in Nashville.
Rick Nash scored a seeing eye goal in the fist period off a rush down the left wing.
“I didn’t think we played very well in the first period,” Nashville head coach Peter Laviolette said. “I thought we got a lot better in the second half of the game, but the first period, for me, we turned the puck over too many times at their blue line. They’ve got such good speed and good transition, we knew we couldn’t do that.”
Mike Fisher tied the game 1-1 in the second period.
Lundqvist had taken a bench seat and watched Antti Raanta start four straight games before getting back to his net.
“We rely on our system, on each other out there,” Lundqvist said. “There’s going to be breakdowns, but we try to cover up for one another and we try to make big plays at the right time.”
The Rangers have won five of six and three of those were by shutout.
WATCH: All Rangers vs. Predators highlights
Lundqvist has stopped 58 of 59 shots in his last two starts.
“Our goaltender really stepped up in that third period. I liked our first two periods, but in the third you’ve got to give credit to our goaltender,” Rangers head coach Alain Vigneault said of Lundqvist bailing out his team. “At the end of the night, it’s about finding ways to win and we found a win to win tonight. We weren’t at our sharpest maybe for 60 minutes, but we got two points that are real important and we’ll take it.”
Jusse Saros made 26 saves in taking the loss for the Preds.
Jimmy Vesey and Mats Zuccarello scored in the skills competition to get the win for New York.
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