NEW YORK (NY) – Coming into Tuesday night much of the talk was that tonight’s game would determine the fate of New York Rangers head coach Alain Vigneault. Whether or not it was true, the Rangers matchup against the Vegas Golden Knights was as close to a must win as you can get this early in the season.
After exchanging leads throughout the game, the blueshirts walked away with a 6-4 victory at Madison Square Garden.
From the get-go, it was apparent how quick this young Golden Knights team were. They were fast to the puck and followed each others lanes very well. The Rangers were able to match their intensity and take the 1-0 lead early when David Desharnais found Jimmy Vesey for an easy one-time shot from the top of the crease.
Though there were some spurts of life from New York, the rest of the first and second period seem to be overwhelming dominated by the Knights. Their first goal came from who else, former-Ranger Oscar Lindberg after Alex Tuch danced around defenseman Stephen Kamper and got a shot on net. The rebound went straight to Lindberg who tapped it in to tie the game at one.
Reilly Smith got his third of the year with less than a minute in the first to take the lead.
The second period was more of the same, as the Rangers got their opportunities but Vegas got more quality chances. Henrik Lundqvist played like a man possessed, stopping shots on the second, third and sometimes fourth chances.
After Smith and David Perron each got a goal in the second for a 4-2 lead, it wasn’t looking pretty.
The Knights were playing their fourth string goalie, Maxime Lagace, since the three goalies in front of him were all injured. Up to this point he had 25 saves on 27 shots and was only looking to get more comfortable.
New York came out blazing, creating all the chances and drawing penalties. Perron took a four minute penalty after taking two individual minors in one shift. The Rangers immediately capitalized when Mika Zibanejad found Chris Kreider to get within one.
Four minutes later, some beautiful fore-checking from Pavel Buchnevich resulted in his fifth goal of the season, when his pressure led to Zibanejad wide open, only to dish it back to Buchnevich for the wide open put back.
With the game tied at two, Rangers got another power-play they would take advantage of when Zibanejad wripped a shot short side on Lagace for the go-ahead goal. Michael Grabner added a late empty netter for the 6-4 final.
Legace would end the game with 28 saves on 33 shots while Lundqvist stopped 34 of 38.
The win gives New York their fourth win of the season, but despite walking away with a victory the rumors will certainly continue to spread. Will Vigneault be fired? Are the Rangers looking to make a trade for depth down the middle? Will they look for future prospects?
Time will tell, but a win is a win. What we know for sure, what happens in New York…will be extremely over analyzed.
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