First Period:
- Sam Bennett (6) Assists: Evan Rodrigues (5)
Second Period:
Third Period:
- Vladimir Tarasenko (3) Assists: Anton Lundell (9), Eetu Luostarinen (5)
- Artemi Panarin (5) Assists: Vincent Trocheck (12), Adam Fox (8)
Stats:
Adam Rotter:
- The better team won. The Panthers were bigger, stronger, faster and had everyone committing to the same style of play. Florida won more battles, kept more pucks in at the blue line, clogged up the neutral zone and the Rangers either couldn’t figure out a way to get past all of that or they did have a way and just couldn’t execute. The Panthers played with confidence and flow from line to line and the Rangers seemed tentative and struggled with the Florida pressure. The Rangers showed at times that they could play well, but they struggled to sustain it shift-to-shift, let alone period-to-period and game-to-game.
- With tonight, again, the better, more structured and confident team won. The Rangers had some pushes early, but they didn’t put up nearly the fight you would have expected. The Panthers do deserve credit for their commitment to their defense and style of play and tonight was just like most of the games in the series. The Panthers were good, the Rangers struggled with the puck and couldn’t find a way to threaten offensively.
- We knew coming into the playoffs that the Rangers were going to go as far as Igor Shesterkin and their special teams could take them. Shesterkin was a monster and the special teams were great…until they weren’t. The PP went ice cold after Game 3 against Carolina. Their opportunities decreased after Game 3 of the second round which either means that the refs decided to call fewer penalties or the Rangers weren’t working hard enough to draw them. They moved players around into different spots to try and spark something, but it didn’t work. This has been the Rangers strategy for the last three years and it’s worked, but the question was always going to be what the Rangers would be if the PP went cold? We got that answer and the season is over.
- It’s hard to evaluate this playoff run because they were, again, within two games of going to the Stanley Cup Final, but we rarely ever saw the Rangers at their best. If not for Chris Kreider in the third period of Game 6 against Carolina, it’s more than likely that the Rangers don’t even get to the Conference Finals. Carolina had all the momentum and had been the better team for most of the series. Maybe the Rangers would have won in Game 7 and still gotten to the Conference Finals, but I feel like instead we would be taking about the Rangers epic collapse.
- We just kept waiting for the Rangers to raise their game, for them to stop getting caved in defensively and for their top players to get going and they rarely did. Even going back to the Washington series I kept waiting for the Rangers to be better. They were in spurts, but for the most part they just kept winning with their goaltending, the PP and some timely goals/bounces. For whatever reason, maybe they were out of gas or Florida was just so smothering, we never saw the Rangers firing on all cylinders. All series they just had so much trouble handling the puck.
- What makes this so tough is how good Shesterkin was. Short of him stopping every single shot, it’s hard to imagine him being better than he was. What also makes it tough is the fact that they were finding ways to win. For as much as I wish they played a better overall game, the fact that they kept winning made you think that maybe this team had it.They’d be getting caved in, but Shesterkin was great and then Barclay Goodrow or Alex Wennberg would score in OT and it made you think that maybe it was their year, that they had the magic with them or something. Who knows what happens if the Rangers win in Game 4 and go up 3-1 against the Panthers. Maybe the Panthers would have won three straight like I think Carolina would have won 4 straight or maybe they get another bounce and we are getting ready for Edmonton or Dallas.
- But Shesterkin was just incredible. He gave them a chance and won games that they didn’t deserve to win. But much like we saw throughout Henrik Lundqvist’s career, he can’t do it on his own. Eventually you need to score.
- It’s a tremendously disappointing series for Artemi Panarin, Chris Kreider and Mika Zibanejad. Panarin fell back into his playoff style of the last two years. He just never seemed confident when he had the puck, he was forcing plays and seemed to have as many turnovers as completed passes. He was so good this season and he was good enough through the first two rounds, but in the biggest moments he was ineffective. Zibanejad and Kreider had good regular seasons, but they also both went cold for long streaks. Like Panarin, both were good in the first two rounds and obviously Kreider carried them past Carolina in Game 6, but they were so vastly outplayed by the Panthers and their best players. It’s also hard for Kreider to be effective in front of the net if the Rangers never have the puck. I also wondered all season why Zibanejad seemed to be shooting less. Part of that, especially on the PP was Panarin shooting more, but it just felt like Zibanejad wasn’t winding up and using one of his best assets as much as he should have.
- On the other hand, Vincent Trocheck and Alexis Lafreniere were phenomenal all playoffs. They were the Rangers two best and most consistent forwards. Trocheck was just all over the place and always involved. Lafreniere took major steps in the regular season to entrench himself as a huge part of the Rangers core, but he took even bigger steps in the playoffs. He went to the net, he was confident and played like someone who, with Adam Fox and Igor Shesterkin, could be leading the Rangers for many years to come.
- Fox was clearly hampered after getting hurt in Game 4 against the Caps. He wasn’t hurt enough to keep him out of the lineup, but he was mostly a shell of the player we know he is. I think that the Rangers have to start next season with K’Andre Miller and Braden Schneider on the second pair. The two of them looked really solid for most of the playoffs. But those two being together means that Jacob Trouba is an $8 million dollar Captain on the third pair. I thought Trouba really struggled for a lot of the playoffs. He led them in penalty minutes by a large margin and looked often like he was trying to do too much.
- Outside of Lafreniere’s continued emergence, I think the other biggest thing to come out of the playoffs, in terms of the future, was that Filip Chytil returned. I had very little expectation for what Chytil might be able to bring, but the fact that he returned and we didn’t have to wait until training camp to answer whether he would is big.
- Overall it was fun playoff run with great goaltending and lots of OT wins, but it ends in disappointment and with them getting what they deserved. They had a great season, but it ends the same way it did two years ago and ultimately like every other season has since 1994. I’d expect much of the team to return next year and maybe they will learn from this, get better, supplement where needed and make another run next year, but it’s so hard to get back to where they were. They can certainly do it, but not without their best players being their best players.