In New York, the Rangers might have been excused for coming into Tuesday’s tilt wit the Dallas Stars on a bit of a let down after the stirring 6-5 win over the New York Islanders on Sunday in the Stadium Series. 
To contrary, Igor Shesterkin made 41 saves to back stop a 3-1 win for the Rangers.
New York improved to 37-16-3.
“We play our best every night and we’re on one page right now,” Shesterkin said.
They have won eight straight.
With the Rangers buzzing the Dallas net in the first period, Adam Fox wristed home the ice breaker at 7:46 of the period.
“We’ve been winning in different ways,” Fox said. “This is the time where you see points are so crucial, you start getting a playoff picture and you win eight straight and teams are still right there with you. You can’t take your foot off the gas, and we recognize that.”
Kaapo Kakko advanced the lead to 2-0 in the middle frame.
With K’Andre Miller and Erik Gustafsson skating circles around the Stars’ defenders, Kakko wristed a shot into the near upper corner of the cage for a 2-0 lead.
The goal came at 8:25 with the teams skating four a side.
“I’ve got to find a way to put him out there more,” Ranger coach Peter Laviolette said. “That’s on me, because I think he’s playing well right now.”
That’s right, Kakko is on a five-game point streak, and has been a solid two-way player since his return to the lineup form injury.
“Most of the night we went glove and we needed to go blocker, and he went on the short side on the blocker and made a really nice goal,” Laviolette said. “I do think confidence plays into that.”
Dallas dropped to 34-15-8off their third straight loss.
“Our guy was pretty good too, but that was elite goaltending for sure,” Dallas coach Peter DeBoer said. “[Tyler] Seguin and [Jamie] Benn both point blank at the end. We had a few there. You have to give them credit, he was really good, but you know that going in. You know he’s one of the best in the League, so you’ve got to get some more traffic, you’ve got to make it more difficult on him and find a way. But we created enough chances to score more than one goal tonight.”
Dallas quickly replied to the Kakko goal with a marker from Miro Heiskanen at 9:10 of the second to trim the deficit to 2-1.
“We definitely had our chances,” Dallas’ Jamie Benn said. “I think we’re actually playing pretty good. [Monday] night was a great effort. Tonight, probably not for 60 minutes, but we had a chance to win that game. It just didn’t happen. We’re sticking with the game plan here.”
Shesterkin locked down the crease from that point forward making unnecessarily spectacular saves including 17 in the third period.
Vincent Trocheck sealed the 3-1 win when he hit an empty net at 18:18.
Shesterkin was forced to make his best, and most critical, saves the rest of the way to protect the lead.
“We left January, left the (All-Star) break and came in and said, ‘We’re turning the page here, this is a new chapter, our actions are the ink, write it down and say what you want to say,'” Laviolette said. “We’ve just been moving slow with it and the guys have been buying into that.”
Use CodePHN15 0 Shesterkin earns the #PHNChairoftheNight for his 41 saves in Rangers 8th straight win
Scott Wedgewood made 23 saves in the loss.
You must be logged in to post a comment.