B R O A D W A Y***B L U E S H I R T S

Blueshirt Bulletin
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March 20, 2007

Rangers' Luck Holds Out
UPDATE: Dubinsky and Liffiton back to Hartford. Shanahan, Straka, and Weekes all practiced today -- Shanahan likely to play tomorrow, Straka not until Saturday. Hollweg and Rozsival given the day off to rest. Tyutin still two weeks away, Hossa three weeks away, Rachunek three to four weeks. For more, see Rangers Report and Blueshirts Blog.

Despite their 6-1-3 record in their last ten games going into last night's Garden match-up with the similarly streaking Penguins, the Rangers had the aura of a team experiencing recurring nightmares that kept them from doing even better and climbing up the standings to a comfortable playoff position. The slew of injuries, the blown leads, the deflections off sticks into their own net, the power play unplugged, the barrage of shots on goal yielding too few goals -- you know the litany. Only the near-perfect goaltending of Henrik Lundqvist was keeping them in the playoff hunt. But last night, luck broke the Rangers' way for a second straight game for the first time in forever.

Sure, the power play continued to misfire after its 4-for-7 aberration against Boston, going 0-for-5, the second unit now overpassing as much as the first unit. Sure, it took 83 shots (42 on goal, 38-16 after the first ten minutes) to get two goals. Sure, they squandered another third period lead, although it was only a one-goal lead this time. Indeed, with Pittsburgh's back-up goalie Jocelyn Thibault looking far too good in net, this game uncomfortable resembled the Rangers' overtime loss in Atlanta last Friday night, a game in which they outshot the Thrashers only 32-12 over the final 45 minutes but couldn't seal the deal on six power play chances against their backup netminder and ended up squandering a valuable point.

But the Rangers got the one lucky break they needed this time, the same lucky break Pittsburgh has gotten against them a couple of times this season (Sidney Crosby's deflection off Aaron Ward with three seconds left in a tie game back in October, the overtime goal off Marek Malik's stick last week). Jaromir Jagr's centering pass in the final minute was swept into the net for the game winning goal by a Penguin defenseman trying to block it. It was Jagr's first goal in nine games, on his 39th shot on goal during that span. "I thought we had tough luck in games we should easily win, we somehow lose it," he said. "I always believe as long as you work hard, the luck might change on your side. Tonight hopefully was a start."

Part of the Rangers' luck was catching the Penguins on the second night of back to back games, their third game in four nights, their fifth game in seven. They looked tired -- until they scored the equalizer late in the third period. Then they suddenly got their legs back. Tom Renney, who does not often match lines, tried something early that he wasn't sure would work, but did -- he played his fourth line, with Blair Betts between hitters Ryan Hollweg and Colton Orr, against Sidney Crosby, the league's top scorer. Not only did they stop Crosby, they scored a goal to boot, Betts deflecting a Dan Girardi shot past Thibault early in the third period -- it was Betts's third goal against the Penguins this season, out of his total of nine.

"Secret weapon," Renney quipped of the match-up. "I thought with his [Betts] experience in face-offs and maybe Ryan with his energy would keep people on their toes and Colton can probably do the same on the other side -- provided we didn't spend an awful lot of time in our own end. I came out of the coaches' room thinking I'm just going to roll through these lines and wear them out. After the first couple of shifts, I thought, 'Bettsy's line can pull this off.' So Crosby's line was the only match-up I was looking for." Betts said, "We stepped up big time. There have been a number of times in the last dozen games or so where the majority of our ice time has come against the other teams' top line. We don't try to do too much offensively -- we create our offense off forechecking. Our mindset is to play good defensively." Added Hollweg: "We were able to get a good forecheck going and make them come two hundred feet all the time. That was a huge bonus for us keeping them off the scoresheet tonight."

Game reports from the Daily News, Journal News, Newsday, Times, Post, Advance, AP, SNY, and Pittsburgh's Post-Gazette and Tribune-Review. Additional notes from the News, Newsday, and USA Today, mostly about the impending return of Brendan Shanahan and the lack of severity of Martin Straka's knee injury. Chris Simon will not be criminally charged for his stick attack on Hollweg, primarily because of Hollweg's desire not to press charges -- see the News, Newsday, Times, and Post. The Times also has an interesting look at shootouts -- particularly how great offensive players don't always do as well as unlikely shootout heroes.

Posted by Dubi on March 20, 2007 at 12:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (8) | TrackBack (0)

montreal wins over boston ( shocker there, huh ? :rolleyes: )

ward ties it up , bolts and isles tied at 3 13 : 50 left


isles being outshot 35-18 , 3rd period



i dont know why but i cannot find the NJ devils game on my shitty time warner cable


toronto up by 1 , 3rd period


lets go Isles [ in regulation )

metsfan531941 wrote:

fuck fuck fuck FUCK


isles loose in ot 4-3. theres your jerky 3 point game rangers fans

not a good night for us Blueshirts fans.

yet another 3 point game
and the leaves beat the devils.

figures

at least we're still in 7th .

gotta beat the flyboys tomorrow night with Shanny coming back.



[size=+3] - _/ _/ _/ Lets Go Rangers \_ \_ \_ - [/size]

NY PJ1 wrote:

especially at MSG 2 ON SUNDAY

12:30 pm ?

i cannot stand these matinees in the middle of the weekend afternoons.

The Garden East will be rocking ,
Shanny will be back,

and Callahans first game at the Garden East, seeing what the rivalries all about .