First Period:
- Vincent Trocheck (4) (Shorthanded) Assists: Jordan Staal (5)
- Mika Zibanejad (6) (Power Play) Assists: Adam Fox (10), Artemi Panarin (6)
Second Period:
- Teuvo Teravainen (4) (Power Play) Assists: Seth Jarvis (4), Tony DeAngelo (8)
Third Period:
- Andrei Svechnikov (4) Assists: Brett Pesce (2), Martin Necas (4)
Stats:
Adam Rotter:
- This was the Carolina team that I’ve been expecting to see all series. They tilted the ice, played fast and gave the Rangers barely any space to create offense or shoot pucks. They were relentless, on their game for 60 minutes and looked the best that they have since the third period of Game 1.
- The Rangers just looked like they were on their heels all night and that is to be expected when you barely have the puck and spend the whole game defending. Igor Shesterkin, and a couple of posts, kept the Rangers in it on their scoreboard, but this looked a lot like those games in the regular season where Carolina was just dominant.
- Who knows how the game changes if Ryan Strome’s goal isn’t called back for offsides? With the way Carolina was pressuring and possessing the puck all night you’d expect that they would have eventually tied it, but maybe Igor Shesterkin would have shut the door. The Rangers had plenty of time after that to make something happened and they didn’t, couldn’t or both.
- Carolina just shut them down tonight in a clinical matter. Gerard Gallant is always positive, at least publicly, but he probably needed to get a little creative in trying to get Mika Zibanejad away from Jordan Staal. That said, Artemi Panarin made a nice pass to Zibanejad on the goal, but he had another game that left a lot to be desired.
- Gallant did flip the lines back to how they were earlier in the series with Filip Chytil on the top line, Alexis Lafreniere on the second line, and Copp and Vatrano on the third line. I’d expect that he will return to the regular lines for Game 6, but I think we could also see Panarin with Zibanejad and Kreider to try and load up if things start slow.
- So now we move to Game 6 and the return to MSG. The Rangers are as confident at MSG as the Hurricanes are in Carolina, so I’d expect the Rangers to come out flying on Saturday with their season on the line. They need to score first and maybe even the first two goals because playing from behind against Carolina is not a recipe for success. They need to get out to a lead, hopefully build on it and then let Igor Shesterkin carry them back to Carolina.
- The Rangers have shown, at least at MSG, that they can beat Carolina, but if the Hurricanes bring this level to Game 6 then someone is going to need to step up in a big way, outside of Shesterkin, to keep the season going.