Weekend Split, but I'll take it

To realistically catch the Flyers and have a shot at the 4 seed in the east (and home ice in the first round), the rangers needed to win all of their final 4 games against philly (since philly has 2 games in hand). After the depressing loss yesterday, it's not out of reach, but Rangers absolutely had to win the next 3, starting with today on home ice.

Thanks to solid Hank again, a more and more dominant avery, and a resurgent power play (which got plenty of practice) the rangers were able to overcome some tired legs, and some awful announcing by Doc Emrick, to hammer the flyers 4-1. The win moves the rangers up to 80 points on the season and guarantees they will stay in the top 8 heading into next week. It also moves the rangers 4 points back of philly for that 4 spot in the east and keeps some hope alive to attain that spot.

Some highlights:

- Avery, 2 goals, drew a couple of penalties, and took a very debatable one (an interference on the goalie where he was pushed into the goalie, made an effort to not run him over, and it was still called. The refs were terrible all game, but for the most part it benefited the rangers, since the flyers, while the bigger team, clearly had no legs coming off yesterday and were hooking almost every minute to compensate for their lack of energy). Avery was probably the quickest skater on the ice, constantly driving to the net and putting pressure on Nitimaki. NBC did a nice job of showing Avery keeping his stick on the ice for his first deflection of a hard slap shot from Morris. Often players leave their sticks up, and try and bring them down when the shot is on the way, which is MUCH more difficult then starting low and bringing your stick up. Also having the stick low gives a guy like Morris a target to shoot for. As big of a jerk as he is on the ice (which helps him take the star player on the other team out of his game), Avery actually is an incredibly well schooled, fundamentally strong player, who happens to also be a great skater. Avery has played his "best game with the rangers" now three straight games.

- The Rangers power play was strong. They got a lot of work thanks to a ton of calls on philly (most of them deserved). Morris really looked great with his ability to not only find the open man, but to actually SHOOT when he had a lane. Antropov also scored his third goal with the rangers, second on the power play. He has very talented hands, and is a big body that plays down low. I think it would be fair to say outside of Hank; Avery, Antropov, and Morris have probably been the rangers 3 best players the last 5 games. (Gomez has been solid as well, but I give the edge to those guys)

- The rangers penalty kill was excellent again. They gave up a deflected goal in the second period, but otherwise gave up almost no chances short handed on Hank. Sjostrom and Betts are fantastic on the kill. Betts has now almost reached that special "He's overrated for being underrated" place as a player. He is one of, if not the best penalty killing forward in the league, and for the most part, announcers never notice this. So it went un-noticed for well over a year. Then finally, one announcer says it, and it immediately goes on every announcer's pregame notes sheet that "betts top penalty killer for rangers, underrated". So now every time the rangers do a game on Versus, or NBC, some announcer that has covered them maybe twice all year has to say how great Betts is on the kill to show he knows what he is talking about.

- Hank, strong per usual. Coming off a tough game in Philly, glad torts went back to him infront of the home crowd today. With the win, Hank now 5-1, 2.16 GAA the last 6 games in net (Rangers 5-2 last 7). Hank has been incredible down the stretch in each of the last 3 seasons, need to have that again.

Guys I have been on, and how they did today:

- Redden and Doobie: Neither had ANY positive impact on the game. They weren't bad though, they just didn't do much if anything. That's the way it has been with these two most of the year. Redden either is no help on the power play, lets a puck hop over his stick that turns into a goal the other way, and plays soft, OR he has a game like today where he did nothing to stand out, but didn't hurt the team. Hard to imagine 5 more years of this type of play (for 30 million dollars). Doobie on the other hand isn't washed up, he just won't realize his talent (or his talent was drastically overestimated). When he tries to be physical, he takes a penalty hitting guys upstairs with his elbows. On offense, you didn't even know he was on the ice.

- Rozsival:.......wow....just wow. That's all I can say. I don't think it is a completely absurd statement to say that was the worst game a rangers defenseman has played this year, in a winning effort. He was taking bad penalties, he missed a WIDE OPEN NET on a perfect feed from callahan rush, at the time a huge missed shot. He is playing incredibly soft, and on the powerplay, he is starting to do more and more of a Dan girardi-esque slow wrister with nothing on it towards the net in traffic that never even gets close to the goal. He makes VERY slow decisions with the puck. He looks lost. 3 more years of him and redden together at 11 mill a year is a bit of a nightmare. (Mark Streit, with the Islanders, got a 5 years, 21 million dollars deal in the offseason. Rozsival got 4 years and 20 mill. Streit was a part of a Montreal power play that led the league in goals two years in a row, and he was a huge factor why. Now he is playing great on a terrible Islanders team. Where was sather???)

Today was a huge win. Team played hard after a tough loss yesterday, gotta rest for an ENORMOUS game on tuesday in Montreal, where the rangers play has been "poor" the last two seasons.

Only game of relevance the rest of the day, Bruins at Pittsburgh. Pittsburgh is hot, Bruins are skidding badly. I really can't root for a team from Boston because I have a college education and no one in my family has ever been a roofer or worked with any type of stones or bricks for a living that I know of. Also most people in my family would probably think the guy that bashes a girls head into a windshield over and over because of something she said was at fault, not the other way around (http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2009/03/13/many_boston_teens_surveyed_say_rihanna_is_at_fault_for_assault/) OOh well, hope pittsburgh loses.

Not deserving of a title (this post, not the rangers)

Well Dave, I would say that was one of the worst games of the season, but 1) it wasn't, there have been so many complete no shows from this team, that that one doesn't really stand out, 2) When I found out Hank wasn't starting, I started drinking so much and so fast that I can't recall most of the game anyway.

I have to disagree about sitting Hank. Where you saw brilliance, I saw the sort of stupidity that I did when the red sox decided to rest pedro for game 5 of the 1998 ALDS against the cleveland indians. Of course there never was a game 5, pedro got rested all winter, and it was a move that has helped make Boston the most talked about least successful team in sports, outside of the cubs.

The rangers had two days off prior to Sunday's game against the Bruins, and have the next two days off. I am not sure how much rest Hank needs, but I don't see a large difference between resting 4 days out of 6, and 5 days out of 6. And if Torts was that worried about rest, he could have played Hank last night, against a team the Rangers desperately needed to beat on the road, and he could start Valiquette in Nashville on thursday, against a weaker less relevant team to the standings for the rangers. That would give Hank a full four days off prior to the philly game on sunday.

Much like that pedro game though, it may not have made a difference. The red sox scored only one run in that little league, joke of a park they call fenway, and the rangers got shut out last night, so in retrospect, maybe getting Hank the rest works out. But I don't know how it affects the psyche of the team when they know it's a "must win" game, and they are going with their backup goalie? I am sure everyone like vally on the team, and they talk about how he prepares himself, and blah blah blah, but I am relatively confident that if you asked every ranger last night, was that a game they had to win, they would have said "yes", and if you asked them if they wanted hank in goal for that must win they would have said "yes". Perhaps they pressed on offense even more with Hank out? Who knows.

I knew getting sh*tfaced was the only way I was going to be able to watch that game. Two falls ago the rangers had a game in carolina that I am still seething about. For some reason the officiating gets particularly bad on the boys in blue when they head down to Carolina. That game was won when Shanny roofed a perfect shot over fatty Cam Ward to seal a 4-2 win. Shanny is gone now, off helping the devils lead the Atlantic Division, while the rangers are now sitting in 9th in the wake of the putrid play of one Aaron Voros. (There have been other culprits, most notably redden, roszival, drury to some extent, gomez, dubinsky, kalinin, etc, but Voros was the shanny sub that would play infront of the net and get tip ins. Somehow sather thought a "journeyman" could do the job of a "hall of famer")

In the end, the defensive highlight of the night was marc staal on lying on his stomach, slapping away the puck from a carolina player to prevent a 2 on none right in front of Vally. The offensive highlight was Dubinsky lying on his back, forgetting he was playing hockey and not basketball, and trying to throw the puck into the net. Anytime the highlights of the evening come with your players horizontal to the ice, you probably didn't put up a great performance, and they didn't.

But they have a game in hand on carolina, and they play most of the teams ahead of them down the stretch. They control their own destiny. I just hope Hank will be in net for it.

Note: I have never, and will never proofread. Thanks.

Beating the Bruins

Big win, needed it, now 3 in a row. Gotta get a nice little 9 out of 10 going.

Hank was strong again, gave up 2 goals in a 2 minute span in the third, but I credit that with lax defense mainly.

1) No idea what redden is thinking. He has a man in the corner, with no angle on hank, let him take that shot, it has no chance. But instead, he has his stick covering the shooting lane, and leaves a passing lane to the middle of the ice wide open? Just an awful idea. It'd be like in hoops if you had a guy trapped in the corner, and positioned your body to keep him from going out of bounds rather than cutting off the clear passing lane back to the center of the court. That's a pretty big foul up for a veteran defenseman that led to a one timer from 8 feet out in front of the net, and the tying goal

2) And NBC highlighted Andropov as doing this, but multiple Rangers forwards in the third got very careless with their defense. Andropov wasn't taking care of his area of the ice, and was just skating around chasing the puck, leaving large areas wide open. I don't know how the rangers can leave Chara, the only guy with a legit slap shot on the bruins (who also might have the best in the NHL, certainly the hardest), wide open and give him 20 feet of room in every direction to rip 100 mph shot on hank. A pretty shaky defensive third almost cost them.

But I did like that they were very aggressive even when they had the 3-1 lead. Part of the Renney era was sitting back, little to no fore-check, and just looking to keep the puck out of their zone. (In fairness to Renney, they did end up winning most of their games) But when a team was able to come back and tie, you knew the game was over because the rangers had been back on their heels for a full period. Not to mention they used this technique even when they only had one goal leads, with more than ten minutes left.

Torteralla seems pretty relaxed, but also like he is getting the guys to play real hard. They have definitely crashed the net more in these last 3 games then they had in any 3 game stretch all season. And the end result, thanks to some horrific goal tending by fernandez today, is 14 goals in 3 games. (Normally when NBC spotlights a guy they get overly dramatic or exaggerate how bad or good his play is, but they were right on with fernandez. He was in such horrible position most of the game, and he was jumping around all over the place, allowing rebounds and open nets. The announcers got it right when they said he looked "like a rec league goalie")

Anyway, 14 goals the last 3 games, 3-0-0 record (6 points out of a possible 6)
13 goals the prior 8 games going 1-4-3 (5 points out of a possible 16)
Moral of story, crashing net is good, scoring goals is good.

Also, the power play, while not all there yet, does look a lot better. (Not to get on redden too much, but he still is a non-factor on it. He is sitting out at the blue line, right on the blue line, on the left side of the ice, doing NOTHING. He doesn't pinch in, he is in no position to score from there, and for anyone to reach him with a pass they have to throw it all the way across ice, through lanes where defenders most likely are, and if he doesn't handle it perfectly, since he is on the blue line, it will pop over and go out of the zone) They are now around 23% on the power play under Torterella in 5 games, compared to around 14-15% prior.

Hank with 36 saves deserved a win, good to get him one.

And the Avery factor, I thought he played strong (especially given he doesn't have his legs back yet), and had a couple of bursts of speed that led to some nice chances. The call in the last minute on the interference maybe was legit, but rider did the EXACT same thing, except more flagrant, to Gomez 3 minutes prior and nothing was called. I don't like when the refs take the game into their hands, that call should not have been made, or you have to make the Gomez call also, can't only have one. Regardless, now 2-0-0 with Avery, and 52-23-13 with Avery as a ranger.

Looking ahead, tomorrow at Carolina is an ENORMOUS game. Then they have a stretch where the final 14 games they play Philly FOUR times. The big mark the calendar stretch is March 28 to April 12. Over those 15 days the rangers have away games at Pittsburgh, Boston, and Carolina (places they have had trouble winning these past two seasons. Home games against New Jersey and Montreal (two teams they have not played well against this season), and then they finish the season with a home and home against the flyers, the back end being in Philly. That's 7 HUGE games in 15 days. And the way the standings are, barring pretty big slumps from the top 3 teams in the east, you have to think those positions are set. But the rangers could easily end up as the #4 seed and have home ice in the first round, or they could end up out of the playoffs altogether. Scoreboard watching from here on out:

Pittsburgh, Philly, Carolina, Florida, Buffalo, Montreal and the Rangers. 7 teams fighting for 5 spots.

Penguins playing the caps today, Montreal playing the stars. Both penguins and Canadians are on road. Hope the home teams get the job done (in regulation)

-Bruce

"finishers" that didn't actually finish

I enjoying watching the rangers show their youth. I was happy with the deadline deals. They aren't making the rangers a legit cup contender, but they do make the team better offensively, and I was happy to see Dawes and Prucha go. I guess I was in the minority of fans that was not a huge fan of either player. I love giving young guys a shot, but those guys were too one dimensional. Neither could pass (Prucha didn't even try), they didn't hit (Prucha tried, but it had no effect given size), they were awful defensive players, and usually Dawes' biggest impact on games were lazy passes out of his own zone that were intercepted and turned into a breakaway goal on hank (like the one against the caps with Ovechkin that helped blow the 4 goal lead). Both guys were just "finishers" that didn't actually finish. (In part because they got inconsistent playing time, but really, Prucha hasn't been the same since he got to play with Jagr on the power play in 2005-2006 when the league was just getting used to the new rules and Jagr was in an mvp season, and Dawes has shown flashes, but never puts it together) And neither played in front of the net, which we desperately need. Avery and Andropov for Dawes and Prucha is a massive offensive upgrade, but it also makes us a lot more physical, and gives us some guys who will screen the goalie.

I like giving young guys a shot, but when they don't pan out, they need to be moved while they still have some value. I don't expect Dawes or Prucha to come back to bite the rangers. And getting rid of Kalinin....well we never should have got him. He was awful from day one. There's a reason he was a third liner in buffalo, not sure why we were so eager to get his services. Morris's career numbers aren't great, but he was pretty solid when he played with Colorado (the only good team he's played with). Even from last night I really like seeing him actually shoot (and take one timers and slap shots, something he needs to teach Girardi, Staal, Rosival and Redden to do), his shot is low and accurate, and pretty hard. He will be a solid addition. At the very least, he is an upgrade over Kalinin and much more physical, since Kalinin had NO physical presence.

Next on my hit list is Dubinsky. I know they like some parts of his game, but I see ZERO development from him in the last year, if anything, regression. Every time he gets the puck and is moving towards the opposing goalie he ALWAYS takes it wide, rather than trying to get it to center of ice, to avoid a hit. Then when he is real wide, he takes some awful angle wrister with nothing on it that most decent high school goalies would have no problem with given the angle, or he ends up holding the puck, skating wide around the net, and all the way back out to the blue line on the other side, never even getting a shot off! He doesn't know how to create his shot, he doesn't have a good wrister anyway, and he just doesn't play in front of the net enough to get any loose pucks. They like his size and skill set, but I have never been a huge fan, I would explore a trade before he becomes the 12 goal, 20 assist man he appears he is going to be, and his value is completely shot.

- Bruce