In St Paul, the visiting New York Rangers won their third straight in dramatic fashion on Thursday night.
Mika Zibanejad knotted the game at 3-3 in a third period rally and then potted the deciding goal in the skills portion of the evening’s events for a 4-3 win.
Pavel Buchnevich had a goal for the Rangers – file photo by Lewis Bleiman
The Rangers trailed 1-3 heading to the third.
“There sure was no quit in us tonight,” New York coach David Quinn said. “Frustrating game for a lot of reasons. They do a great job defending. They really defend the middle of the rink really well. We just stepped to it. We just never quit. We’ve been talking about the fact that the belief we have in each other continues to grow throughout the season. It was never more evident than it was tonight.”
Alexandar Georgiev made 23 saves in the win.
“I thought we weren’t out of it,” Zibanejad said. “I didn’t think it was that big of a gap in between us, even though it was a 3-1 lead for them. We believe in here. We know when we do things right good things can happen, and they did today.”
Ryan Donato, Jonas Brodin and Jordan Greenway scored for the Wild.
“I feel like we’ve been here before, a couple times where this has happened now, and we have to learn to finish the game,” Donato said. “We have to learn how to close it out there. Yeah, this one stings.”
Pavel Buchnevich got the Rangers close with the first goal of the final frame.
“A couple guys going down throughout the game and guys stepping up and playing everywhere,” the Rangers’ Ryan Strome said. “This is the type of win you want to kind of build on. Hopefully we can keep it going.”
Aremi Panarin scored in the first period.
“This is what it’s going to be for 25 games,” Wild coach Bruce Boudreau said. “I think our problem today was … we need 18 players and a goalie to play great and we didn’t have all 18 players playing at their best today. When we do that, we’ve got good character and they worked hard, but things don’t always go right if they’re not at their best.”
[WATCH: All Rangers vs. Wild highlights]
Alex Stalock made 28 saves in the loss.
“We keep saying [one point is good],” Stalock said. “We need two points right now.”
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