In New York, the Ranges were betrayed by lackadaisical play, poor goaltending, and not so special teams on Saturday night night. In other words, it was a team wide collapse in a 5-2 loss to the Chicago Blackhawks.
Patrick Kane had a goal and three points in the win, and collected his 1,200th NHL point.
“It’s nice to reach it, obviously,” Kane said. “You play a long time in the League you’re going to reach certain milestones. Yeah, it feels good and it’s nice to get it on a night like this where we get a win and you can contribute for the team, too.”
Petr Mrazek surrendered one goal and made 21 saves before leaving the game after the second intermission. Apparently Chicago felt a back up goalie would be enough to snuff out any rally the Rangers might attempt.
Arvid Soderblom made five saves in relief.
Max Domi hit for a pair of goals and three points for the Blackhawks.
Chicago improved to 7-12-4.
The Blackhawks took a 1-0 lead in the first period on a strike from Reese Johnson.
Kane scored in the middle frame on the power play for a 2-0 advantage.
Chicago scored three times on the power play.
“I’m just happy for the players because we’ve deserved a little more success than we’ve had lately,” Blackhawks coach Luke Richardson said. “Some of the downfalls are our own fault, but there’s still been a lot of good hockey played by this team that we didn’t get any results so I’m just happy they got some results tonight. Sometimes that can turn your season around.”
Max Domi pushed the lead to 3-0 in the second, also off the power play.
Mika Zibanejad scored for New York on the power play to cut the score to 3-1 by the end of the second period.
“It’s a results league, you need to win hockey games,” New York captain Jacob Trouba said. “It’s an emotional game. You’ve got to play with some emotion, some energy. It’s not just going to happen. You’ve got to go make it happen, and will it to happen. I think we could use a little more of that.”
It did not get any better for the Rangers in the third. Chicago scored again off the power play when Taylor Raddysh hit for the third power play goal and a 4-1 lead to the Hawks.
Chris Kreider added a so-what goal late with the extra attacker to make it 4-2.
“[Trouba’s] trying to get the guys on board and trying to pull them, big leadership,” New York coach Gerard Gallant said. “He’s trying to get something out of our guys and do the best we can. That’s what leadership is all about. Sometimes it doesn’t happen in one night or two nights, but you’ve got to keep working at it. You’ve got to keep working hard and battling hard, and we’ll come out of this. We know that.”
Domi hit for his scored goal into an empty net for the 5-2 final.
“It’s definitely disappointing,” Trouba said. “I think we could use a little bit more emotion, a little bit more will in our game. It’s not easy. You’re not just out here going for a twirl. It’s a hard game and you’ve got to play it hard.”
Jaroslav Halak made 16 saves, 16 saves, in the loss.
There is no part of this team, or apparently organization, that is working right now.
The rebuild is in shambles, and there are no answers, especially if management is unable or unwilling to make any difficult decisions.
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