The Rangers began their road trip in winning fashion, defeating Arizona 6-3 Thursday. New York lost 2-0 and 3-1 leads before scoring late to take the lead and bolstering it with a pair of goals with less than 30 seconds remaining. The Rangers head to Colorado to face the Avalanche on New Years' Eve.
The offensive story of the this game clearly was Matt Puempel. His first hat trick since his days of the OHL had all three goals occur on the power play, as New York went 4-for-7 with the man advantage. As the post-games noted stated: "the Blueshirts recorded four power play goals in a game for the first time since Feb. 4, 2010 vs. Washington and for the first time in a road game since Dec. 29, 2007 at Toronto (five power play goals)." Puempel second goal was the difference maker, giving the Rangers the 4-3 lead they didn't relinquish. That goal and his first resulted from him solid presence in front of the goalie. Puempel was added to the power play when J.T. Miller was removed during his "punishment" by coach Alain Vigneault.
Nick Holden, who added an assists, giving him 20 points on the year, Chris Kreider and Miller also scored. Holden, who was acquired by the Rangers in June for a fourth round pick, now leads Rangers defensemen in goals with seven, and power play goals with two. Pretty, pretty good. What i found interesting and welcomed is that AV didn't break up the Marc Staal-Holden duo, as the pair has clear chemistry together.
This brings me to my next point and something Sean Hartnett pointed out as well. AV did shift up his d-pairings, moving Kevin Klein up to skate with Ryan McDonagh and Dan Girardi down to the third pair to play with Brady Skjei. The revised top pairing as a duo wasn't bad, but when McDonagh took a questionable penalty in the third and AV went with Klein and Girardi, along with Jesper Fast and Michael Grabner on the penalty kill, it was a tire fire. Arizona controlled the puck the entire PP, resulting in Tobias Rieder's goal.
Despite the sheltered usage noted above, Girardi was horrific again. As Hartnett wrote:
The Rangers were pinned in their own end for long stretches while Girardi and Skjei were on the ice. Girardi committed an unnecessary icing under no pressure, which allowed Arizona to take an offensive zone faceoff and eventually cut into the Rangers’ 2-0 lead late in the first period.Combining the past two games, there has been an alarming amount of unforced icings by Girardi and times he has been burned out wide. Plus/minus might be an archaic stat, but he’s minus-8 over the past six games and hasn’t recorded a point in 12 contests.
Unless something changes soon, where can Vigneault hide him? It would be painful to stick a prideful, popular teammate like Girardi and his $5.5 million cap hit in the press box, but what choice will the Rangers have if his game doesn’t rebound?
The problem is who do you turn to? AV clearly has no confidence in Adam Clendening or he would be playing. As Hartnett pointed out, Ryan Graves, a left-handed shot. has has 17 points, including 13 assists, in 30 games with Hartford, but he is still a work-in-progress. But if going to shelter someone on the third line, he could be an option, skating with Klein while Skjei moves up. Maybe John Gilmour gets a shot or a d-man is imported, but this area is a one that should be a major focus heading to the trade deadline,
I admit I was all for the long-term signing of G and didn't think the six-year, $33 million deal he signed in February 2014 was a bad contract. How wrong I was. I am a huge G fan. i think he has been a warrior and sacrificed his body for the greater good and deserved the A on his chest. But his play has regressed dramatically. I had hoped that he and Staal would benefit from the additional time off this past off-season, using it to recharge their bodies and mind. In Staal case, the time off has worked, as his game has perked back up, aided by skating with Holden. Girardi though has regressed, so it's clear that the time off wasn't the elixir needed. Having $5.5 mil in the press box is not optimal. But, if you look back to the game he missed, Girardi did play better his next contest, so I would love to say resting him periodically would help. But he struggled Tuesday after three days off, so rest is not option. Finding another solid d-man will be key, then, look for G to likely get bought out after the season when only three years remains on his deal.