The old adage is what…it’s better to be lucky than good. Fortunately tonight the Rangers were both. They came out and blitzed the Florida Panthers jumping out to a pretty quick 4-0 lead, and then they got very fortunate with the Cats hitting several posts (maybe 3?). Had those post shots gone in, the Rangers could be in a very different position right now. What position would that be? Somehow, despite not having Marc Staal for 1 second of playing time so far this year, without having nearly any production from their leading scorer from last year, Brandon Dubinsky till the last 5 games, without having any kind of a decent power play, with having major injuries to their defense, the Rangers find themselves, today, a few days before the winter classic, with the best record in the Eastern Conference.

The small caveat being that the Rangers have yet to play the Boston Bruins, who have 2 games in hand on us, and we still have a bunch of games against the Pens, Flyers, and Devils to come. Granted, we have played all 3 of those teams very well, but regardless, those are tough games to win no matter what.

Getting back to tonights game, you do have to at least kind of acknowledge that the Rangers only ran away with this one early because the Panthers backup goalie, Clemmenson, was terrible. He seemed to make himself very small in net, and wasn’t doing a good job of staying square to the shooters or challenging the shooter whatsoever. Brad Richards saw a ton of net when he had his chance, and easily put one by the Panthers goalie. Theodore was a lot better, but by the time he came in the Rangers clearly were looking forward to the winter classic, and at that point, the game was pretty much over. The Rangers sat back, the Cats came on strong, but Henrik Lundqvist closed the door. You don’t like seeing that from this team, the checking out of a game early, but they managed to escape with a win. Lucky, for sure.

Hope everyone had a great holiday weekend! I know I did!

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Just when I was getting all over Brandon Dubinsky, the guy comes through and gives the Rangers a much needed boost. It wasn’t even about the goal he scored, his presence on that 3rd line helped the Rangers roll 3 lines all night without a problem, sprinkling in some 4th line action as well. That is the way John Tortorella wants to run a hockey team anyway. It’s the way he won a championship. Big minutes to the top line. Semi-big minutes to the 2nd line. Medium minutes to the 3rd line. Very light minutes to the 4th line. I’m ok with that to be honest. The Rangers are better when their better players play more minutes. Most teams are. Now if you could get me a 4th line that could actually contribute, I wouldn’t have a problem seeing them 8, 9, 10 minutes a night. But as it is, Rupp, Prust, and Fedotenko shouldn’t see more than 5 or 6 which is pretty much what they got tonight. It will be interesting to see what this team does with Chris Kreider next year. You’d have to assume the kid would have a helluva shot of making this club right out of the gate. How will they do their lines then? These things have a way of sorting themselves out though, so let’s not worry about that right now.

Getting back to the game, I felt the Rangers were really in control of this for the most part. Sure, Biron had to make several outstanding saves to keep the game close, but the Rangers had just as many high quality scoring chances, and you know that this war of attrition was going to be won by the team with the bigger guns. Marian Gaborik, take a bow.

OK, I have to run now, Have to be up in 4 hours to start driving to Indiana. Like I said in my last post, I will be out of town till Wednesday, so no post game wraps till then. Hope you all have a happy holiday season, and here’s hoping the Rangers win all 3 of these games! I also will be recording the World Junior Championships for Team USA, as I want to watch JT Miller closely. This kid really has some promise, I could see him being a Ranger within the next 1-2 seasons.

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For all the praise being heaped on fill ins like Bickel, Erixon, and Stralman. For all the kudos being thrown at the Rangers and what a great job they do backchecking, blocking shots, getting in passing lanes, etc. The cold hard truth is this. This team will only go as far as Henrik Lundqvist will take them. Tonight, he took them to a 4-1 win that is a very, very deceiving score. Yes, it’s true the Rangers hit 4 posts (1 a few moments before a goal was eventually scored anyway), in addition to putting 3 goals past Uncle Daddy (and an empty netter). But the Rangers were outshot 31-21, and were probably outchanced by a 2-1 margin. Henrik Lundqvist was completely on top of his game. Moving side to side at blazing fast speeds, showcasing picture perfect form, being square to the shooter at all times, and forcing the opposition to be too fine with their shots, therefore making them shoot wide. He was a monster. Brodeur was a slug. Slow, predictable, and completely deserving of the loss he took. The Rangers didn’t beat the Devils. Henrik Lundqvist beat Martin Brodeur, end of story.

Give lots of credit to Ryan McDonagh, Michael Del Zotto, and of course Dan Girardi. The remaining Rangers regular defenseman played HUGE minutes and played outstanding. Michael Del Zotto was again a +2, and is a whopping +17 out there, nearly double the next closest Rangers player. This is not by accident. This is a combination of MDZ being matched up against lesser opposition, combined with his ability to transition the puck up the ice quickly and effectively, allowing the Rangers to maintain more offensive zone time. Ryan McDonagh is emerging into a true blue #1 defenseman. This is with the Rangers already having 2 # 1 defensemen in Marc Staal and Dan Girardi. Thanks for that trade Montreal, what the hell were you guys thinking.

I think it’s also obvious that Carl Hagelin has secured himself a spot for the rest of the season. The speedy Swede is making an enormous impact on the Rangers, and once Chris Kreider makes his way to the Rangers you could see the Rangers being a lethal speed team.

Brandon Dubinsky on the other hand continues to drive Ranger fans mad. Still only 1 goal on the season, and you see his offensive game regressing badly. The kid is flat out afraid to shoot. He just has zero confidence. I liked what Torts did out there in putting him on with the Devils net empty, but Dubi never got a chance to finish. The kid really needs to pick up his game. I don’t think he’s expendable, exactly, but he certainly isn’t untradeable with this seasons performance…Derek Stepan on the other hand, well, he’s getting close to being in the untradeable department, and that is saying something. Wow, what a steal this kid has been.

OK, that’s all for now. Just a heads up though. I will be leaving Friday morning for Indiana to spend the holidays with my fiancee’s family. I won’t be back till next Wednesday, meaning I will miss quite a few games. I do plan on recording and watching them, but I won’t do writeups on them since it will be so far after the fact.

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I’m not quite as old as some of the bloggers out there. But I’ve been watching the Rangers, and hockey in general for about 25 years now (from the age of 6), and I have never, ever, seen anything like tonight. A goal with 0.1 seconds remaining? I’ve seen a few 7 second goals. I’ve seen a few dramatic game winners. But 0.1 seconds to go? That is just incredible. The presence of mind that Brad Richards has shown during his short time with the Rangers is just remarkable. He has such a strong feel for the game. For what to do, when to do it, and when to not do something. Sure, there was some luck involved as the puck clearly deflects off of the skate from the defenseman of the next team to be relocated, but the ability to get a shot on goal with the clock expiring, that shows an incredible awareness for the moment. If you’ve never played hockey, and hell, even if you have played hockey, you know sometimes you can lose track of exactly what time is left in the game. How much time is left in a PP, a PK, a 4 on 4, anything. It’s not easy to always tell, even if there are clocks all over the place, your attention is usually so focused on the moment that knowing the peripheral information isn’t easy. Somehow, Richards just….gets it.

The truth of the matter is though, that this game never should have gone to that final 1 tenth of a second. I personally felt the Rangers dominated this game, and even when the next team to be relocated surged, they didn’t allow very many quality scoring chances until they went down 2 men.

Speaking of being down 2 men, do the Rangers have the worst 5 on 3 powerplay in the league or what? I seriously can’t remember the last time the Rangers were able to execute these with any consistency. What do they have, 1 5 on 3 goal all season? Awful, just awful. The inability to bury teams when they take these penalties is extremely frustrating. You would think a team that is playing relatively well on the PP would be able to do something with a 5 on 3, but the Rangers just don’t funnel near enough pucks to the net with low shots looking for rebounds. It’s so annoying.

OK, that’s all for now. Have a good night all!

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My computer had a MAJOR crash yesterday, and since I run an online company that’s a huge problem for me. Just got it back up and running right now. I watched the game, but by now everything that needed to be said about is has been. Sorry about that!

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This one is going to be super short. Operating on about 2 hours sleep from the night before, and I gotta be up in 3 hours. Blech. Rangers played a pretty decent game. They had some good scoring chances, and they played pretty well defensively. When you only give up 1 goal, you usually win. Tonight we didn’t Hey, it happens. Just move along and try to win the next one.

OK, I have to go to bed and try to get what little sleep I can….zzzzzzz

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Rangerboy over on the HFBoards had a few interesting stats.

The Rangers are tied with the Islanders and SJ for fewest games played at 27. The Rangers have the fewest losses in the NHL at 6. 17-6-4.

If the Rangers didn’t blow the 2-1 lead late in the 3rd to TB,the Rangers would be in first place in the Eastern Conference.

Tonight concluded a stretch of 16 straight games against Eastern Conference teams. The Rangers went 12-3-1.

Pretty remarkable numbers right there. 12-3-1 against your own conference…if you think of that in terms of playoffs, that would be heading to the Stanley Cup Finals. Of course that’s not how this works, but still, winning games against good teams on nights you should win are important. And yes, the Rangers should have won this game. It took me all of 5 minutes to realize the Rangers should have won the game. Why? Because Jose Theodore had absolutely zero rebound control tonight. He was kicking out these huge, big, juicy, tasty, succulent rebounds right into the slot all night long. He was fighting the puck big time. He just couldn’t feel the puck, and in the end, it toasted him and his team. Rangers had good slot presence and pucks seemed to find there ways right into those areas. The Rangers also got production from all across their lineup, getting goals from the usual suspects, as well as some timely contributions from guys like Eminger and Stralman.

One thing they are not getting, though, is any production whatsoever from Brandon Dubinsky. Since the Rangers are winning it’s kind of a backstory right now, but let’s face it folks. Brandon Dubinsky has been a black hole offensive for this team all year. 1 goal in 26 games? Hagelin already has 3 times the goals in 1/3 the games. That’s putrid by Dubi. I’m not sure what you do to get the kid going. But I do know that playing him with guys like Prust, Avery, and Christensen will not help him get out of his fun. Not at all. I think he’s trying to do with Dubi what he’s done in the past with Anisimov. Play the kid on the lower lines to get him going and to simplify his game. Except with Dubinsky, his game really hasn’t changed all that much, except he just flat out refuses to shoot the puck. Put him with a guy like Richards. Let Richards get his confidence back by setting Dubi up for a few layups here and there.

That’s my 2 cents anyways. OK, 3:22 am, I should have been in bed 4 hours ago :-X

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Let me just start off by saying this. If you already watched this game, DO NOT, I repeat, DO NOT watch the above highlights. They are from the Buffalo feed and you will be forced to listen to some of the worst announcing in the history of sports done by Rick Jeanneret, who I can not stand. If you are forced to watch the highlights if you missed the game, then for the love of all that is good and pure, please mute your audio.

OK, now that the public service announcement has been taken care of let’s deal with this game. Watching the game (or if you didn’t heed my warning and watched them above) you’d agree with my assessment that there was only 1 legitimate goal scored tonight by either team. Marian Gaboriks laserbeam shot top corner post, in, and out was a shot no goalie in this league will stop. Vaneks goal was borderline, but when you get that much of the puck, and you react as quickly, and correctly as Biron did, you expect that save to be made. Ryan Callahans goal was just awful, as were both of Hagelins goals. So, in reality the Rangers didn’t really play a 4-1 game. They really played a 1-1 or 1-0 game tonight. Luckily, our goalie was spot on other for his 1, questionable goal. Enroth however was just awful. It wasn’t even the goals he gave up, simple saves were hard for him, rebounds were going into prime real estate on shots 99% of the goalies out there freeze easily. Tonight was certainly a case of playing against a goalie having an off night. We had that earlier this season, but that game was a loss (first game against Toronto) so it was good to come out of this one with 2 points.

Smart coaching by Torts in this one. After Gabby made a piss poor decision with the puck, trapping his entire line behind the play, and then half-assed it back, all of us would have benched him. But Torts was smart. He benched him for a period, and in the 3rd he was right back out there. Send the message, but don’t beat the guy down. Gabby carried this team in the 3rd. He was easily the Rangers best forward in the final, and most important period.

That’s all for now. Exhausted!

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Sometimes you win games you should lose, sometimes you lose games you should win. When the former happens everyone just shrugs it off. When the latter happens everyone searches for people to blame. Rangers were significantly better than the Lightning tonight. They just couldn’t put one home. It happens. Forget it and move on.

Regarding the Artem Anisimov play that everyone is talking about. My personal opinion. I don’t care at all about it. I think the Lightning blew it completely out of proportion, and the fact that the Rangers ended up getting more penalty minutes than the Lightning out of that was absolute B.S. The Rangers have a legitimate gripe there. Personally, I can see both sides of the argument. Play with class, don’t show up the opposition, yadda, yadda, yadda. But you know what? Sometimes you get carried away and it happens. I for one, when I score goals in my beer league, never cheer. I just sorta skate away maybe do a few fist bumps with my teammates, etc, but nothing more. I don’t even crack a smile usually. But that’s just me, and that’s just beer league. Real NHL players have real money on the line, with real ramifications for every goal scored. Anisimov just got a little carried away. I get it. Next time though, maybe a little less sniper shot, and a little more arms in the air.

That’s all for now. Sorry for the shortness of this post, I have a ton of other things I have been trying to get through these past few days, not the least of which is planning my wedding with my fiancee. Sometimes real life can screw with your online life

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