Rangers got a lot of great bounces tonight, but more importantly...most importantly, Henrik Lundqvist stood on his head. The Rangers defense also bent but didn't break in a hectic third period where they were outshot 15-1. Mind you, the lone shot was on a delayed offsides, so had it snuck in it wouldn't even have counted. Take that for what it's worth.
But back to what matters. It was a tremendous game from the 32-year old Lundqvist, who was peppered with 41 shots by the LA Kings. Kings also saw two pucks stop at the goal line and ripped two shots off the pipe to boot. Alas, they buried themselves early with some untimely penalties and gave way to a run and gun game from the Rangers early on. It was the Henrik Lundqvist show after that. He was engaged, he was calm, he was poised, and he was exactly what the Rangers needed to survive an onslaught.
Here are the two early Ranger goals, the first was a beautiful tip in by Benoit Pouliot on the powerplay:
The second came on the rush with Marty St. Louis doing what he does best.
The Kings drew one back and shifted momentum in their favor after Dan Girardi blew up his lumber at the King blue line and sprung Dustin Brown on a breakaway.
And when I say momentum started to shift...I mean it shifted completely in the opposite direction. For the rest of the night.
Shots at that point were relatively even 16-15 in favor of the New York Rangers. After the Dustin Brown goal the Rangers sank into a shell, and put up a grand total of 3 shots to the Los Angeles Kings' 26. That's right, for the final 31 minutes of that game the shots were 26-3. Enter Henrik Lundqvist, enter Rangers defense.
As an independent analyst, taking a step back from any sort of bias I may or may not have, the Rangers have to come up with something more than that. They needed all the combined forces of Captain Planet and then some to keep that puck out of the net from middle of the second period on. They did it though.
Credit the mental fortitude of the Rangers, who came out and seized the opportunities to score when they had them. They also stood strong down the stretch and kept a lot of second chances away and got in the passing lanes quite well. However, I just don't think you can allow another complete shelling like that and ask Lundqvist to be God again. The law of percentages will more than likely catch up.
The result was there for New York, but that can't happen again. It was too conservative. I'm pretty certain Vigneault will applaud the effort of that one, but the gameplan was more than desirable for a winning formula. You can't sit on a 2-1 lead with half a game left. It may have worked against the Canadiens at times, but this is a different beast. Again, all credit to them tonight, but as a Rangers fan would you be comfortable playing 3 more games like that?
If you are the Kings...what exactly do you change? Maybe a little more traffic in front? Make it harder for Lundqvist to see the shots? Yea that's a start. Overall though that was the best game of the series for the Kings. If you put that effort forth in the next 3 games you will definitely win one of them. The Kopitar line is still leaving a lot to be desired in my eyes. Brown has had some strong energy the last two games but the duo of Kopitar and Gaborik have seemed to cool off considerably. They are also facing arguably the weakest match they have had in the playoffs. No offense to Derek Stepan, but he is no Jonathan Toews, Joe Thornton, or Ryan Getzlaf.
You can't say the effort was bad. You can't say the game was bad for the Kings either. Was it the right result? No. Play another game like that and more than likely you will win. All of the numbers were in the favor of the Kings, who dominated shots, possession, and faceoffs. Why they didn't dominate was the goal column, and in the end that matters.
Maybe a slight talking point...but sheesh why did Sutter wait until almost a minute left in the game to yank Quick? Also, why on earth was the 4th line out with under two minutes left? Yes they created a scoring chance but wow, wow, wow. I thought we were trying to win a game here?
Oh yea and this:
Hey goal line snow... #LAKings pic.twitter.com/7U92wfGtz4
— Jason Lewis (@SirJDL) June 12, 2014I don't think I've ever seen that before. Two pucks stop on the line. Crazy stuff.
Really not much to say in regards to a breakdown of this game.
Lundqvist was unreal.
Kings played great but didn't score enough.
Park and ride and let's get to Game 5 on Friday already. (Bah, I so badly wanted to be in World Cup mode by then)
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