The only way to describe the Rangers' 3-1 loss to the Hurricanes on Tuesday is ugly. Mistakes littered throughout the game in each zone but especially in the neutral and defensive ones. Turnovers galore, a lack of continuity of offense, but more damning was a lack of effort and compete level.
Game lowlights:
Coach Alain Vigneault summed it perfectly in his post-game remarks:
"Not that I don't want to give credit to Carolina, because they played a good game. But we [gave] away two points because we didn't work. I have not said that very often about the group this year, but right from the start our work ethic wasn't what it needs to be in this league to have any chance. We must have turned the puck over in our end 12 or 13 times in the first period alone."
There were lots of passengers last night, but the biggest offenders may have been Marc Staal and Anton Stralman, each of whom had their worst game in weeks. Pick a goal and you will see those mistakes. On the first, an inability to to get the puck out of the zone led to a 2 on 1 and Stralman rather than standing upright went down too early to block the pass from Jordan Staal, which he failed to do, resulting in the goal by Tlusty. On the second, Staal gets caught pinching, Kreider, Stepan and Nash were slow to get back, Stralman was beaten along the boards and then allowed Jordan Staal to get past him after the pass to Jiri Tlusty, leaving a wide-open net on the 2 on 0. Pure ugliness. The third goal wasn't much better, as the Rangers were beaten down low and the forwards failed to backcheck hard enough and it was 3-1.
The one positive night have been the play of the fourth line, who continued to grind with Derek Dorsett back in the lineup for Daniel Carcillo. As Carp pointed out, Dorsett had six hits, the other 17 skaters had a total of 15. If you take out Stralman, who had four of those, the other 16 skaters had 11 hits. Not acceptable and not Rangers hockey, even under the new regime. The other three lines mailed it in, and heading down the stretch, that's just not acceptable. In general, regardless of game 1 or 81, it's not acceptable, but playoff berths still in the balance, you expect and should be given more by your team.
All that said, I am not about to panic. Of course, as Jimbo and others have said, the referendum daily will be if the Rangers win, great, if they lose, it's because they miss Ryan Callahan. In addition, Martin St. Louis, like every other top end talent that has come here, fails and will continue to fail to score and it's the curse of the Blueshirts. Rick Nash only produces when the planets are aligned correctly. Brad Richards has to be bought out. Carl Hagelin is miscast on the second/third line. While some of those may be true, as we have discussed way too often, it's one game. In the case of St. Louis, it's four games and he is getting chances, so it should only be a matter of time before he breaks through.
I get that we are all frustrated and annoyed and upset. I get we don't understand how they can go from possibly playing their best game of the year to their worst. But remember it's only one game and not a pattern. I don't view the losses to Philly and Boston as the same as the one to Carolina, as in those two, they're were just outplayed while in this one they failed to show up. Am I happy, of course not, but I am not about to panic over the Carolina game, unless a similar result happens the next several games. It would be fallacy to say, remain calm, all is well, but also, going completely crazy makes little sense at all.
Sixteen games to go, key is to make sure this game was an aberration and not portend of things to come.