The Rangers played Friday and Saturday at Traverse City, going 1-0-1 in the two contests. Friday, New York fell 4-3 in overtime Carolina. Saturday, they rallied from 4-2 down to tie Dallas late and win the game in a shootout. Monday, they face Minnesota to determine if they advance to the next round. Below are some quick snippets of information. At the World Cup, three of the five Rangers participating in the tournament played in the first game, with it a good for one and a lousy day for two,
Traverse City:
Game 1 Friday - 4-3 loss in overtime to Carolina
Jimmy Vesey notched a goal and opened the tournament on a line with Boo Nieves and Pavel Buchnevich
Robin Kovacs, who also scored, played with Malte Stromwall, who had an assist, and Steven Fogarty.
Sean Day, who nees some work, beaten by Sergey Tolchinsky on game-winner
Brandon Halverson not strong in net.
Good to see Vesey get going early on. The chemistry of Kovacs and Stromwall, who played together in Sweden, is readily apparent. No one on the blue line was impressive and as of now, Igor Shesterkin looks like a much better prospect than Halverson.
Game 2 Saturday: 5-4 shootout win over Dallas
Stromwall with a pair of goals and one in the shootout, Kovacs with a breakaway goal, both played with Tim Gettinger in this game
Vesey scored in the shootout and had a pair of assists
Nieves, who played on a line with Vesey and Ty Ronning, scored game-tying goal with under a minute remaining
Buchnevich, who had just one shot in the first game, had six shots
Halverson, 36 saves, but hasn't been great in both games, though his defense hasn't helped him much
Kovacs and Stromwall with strong games as well. Vesey continues to produce and looks like someone who should be able to break camp with the parent club after training camp. Ryan Gropp and Brad Morrison have been the two most disappointing forwards, failing to generate much. On the blue line, Day sprung Kovacs for the breakaway goal but has been inconsistent in both games, failing to play at 100 percent effort throughout both contests. Calle Anderson has been the team's best defenseman through two games, which shouldn't be surprising given his experience level.
All eight teams are off today. The Rangers face the Wild on Monday at 3pm. New York needs a win and either a Dallas loss, either in regulation, overtime or shootout, to Carolina in order to advance forward to the third place game, as winning the division and moving to the title game is almost impossible. Carolina is 2-0 with five points, since one win was in regulation and one in overtime. Dallas gained a point in their shootout loss yesterday and earned three point for their regulation win Friday, so they have four points, while New York has three, due to their shootout win and overtime loss. A regulation win gives Carolina eight points, while an overtime one gives them seven and OTL/SO loss gives them six. If Dallas beats Carolina in regulation, they will have seven points while an overtime win gives them six.
World Cup of Hockey:
Team Europe 3 USA 0
Zuccarello had the secondary assist on Team Europe's first goal, which was aided by a poor pinch by Ryan McDonagh, creating the odd-man rush. Frans Nielsen with a beautiful dish to Marian Gaborik, who beat Derek Stepan to the net for the easy tap-in.
Stepan was also involved in the overturned goal. James van Riemsdyk appeared to direct the puck on goal intentionally with his body, and even though it looked it glanced off Stepan's helmet and behind Jaroslav Halak, the goal was overturned. It would have made the score 2-1, instead it stayed 2-0 and when Pierre-Eduuard Bellemare had a beautiful deflection past Jonathan Quick with under 90 seconds to go in the second, it was all she wrote.
Today, Sweden and Henrik Lundqvist takes on Russia while North America and J.T. Miller face Finland, though Miller is a healthy scratch.