After the Rangers were routed in Tampa on Friday but before they were routed in Pittsburgh on Saturday, John Tortorella suggested that it was past time for the locker room to “take ownership” of the inconsistency that has marked the past six weeks.
Fair enough. But when is the head coach going to take similar ownership of a team that is adrift without an identity, attack or defensive posture?
When is Tortorella, whose club gets back on the horse tonight when the Penguins come to the Garden 48 hours after inflicting an 8-3 punishment on the Blueshirts, going to imprint some sort of a stamp on this collection of players he had influence in selecting?
First things first, though: The Rangers need better from Henrik Lundqvist, who presumably will not be bumped from his start tonight by Steve Valiquette, Chad Johnson, Jussi Markkanen, Vitali Yeremeyev or Doug Soetaert, though following this weekend’s goaltending rotation, one never quite knows.
Tortorella’s decision to start Lundqvist in Tampa on Friday while saving Valiquette for the following night’s match in Pittsburgh was tantamount to Joe Girardi giving CC Sabathia the ball in Florida for an interleague game against the Marlins while saving Chad Gaudin for the following day’s opener of a series at Fenway.
Regardless, this does not alter the reality that Lundqvist has been only slightly better than ordinary during the Rangers’ 6-11-1 descent toward the bottom of the Atlantic Division. The King has allowed too many marginal goals, too many on shots that seemed to handcuff or surprise him while deep in the net.
The Rangers aren’t good enough to withstand common play from their uncommonly excellent goaltender. If this is a slump, so be it, but if there are technical corrections to be made in his game, they need to be made immediately.
Tortorella joined the Rangers preaching, “It’s not about defense, it’s not about the defensive zone,” before amending his mantra. The problem is, his team has apparently taken him at his original word, for the Blueshirts enter tonight’s match ranked 24th in the NHL in goals-against average.
The Rangers have no presence in front of their own net — how exactly do we know that Lundqvist isn’t feeling the effect of being smashed down repeatedly by marauding forwards? — and no clue in their own end, where they habitually chase both the puck and opponents.
Tom Renney had his flaws as a coach, but beginning with 2005-06, the Blueshirts ranked fourth, ninth, fifth and sixth, respectively, in team defense.
On Saturday night, the Penguins intermittently teamed Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin on the same line. Yet that was the game in which Tortorella chose to split his shutdown defense pair of Marc Staal and Dan Girardi. Odd.
Tortorella deserves credit for assigning prominent roles to the Youth of Broadway. But now in the teeth of a schedule that mandates matches against the Sabres (twice), Red Wings and Blackhawks immediately following tonight, the Rangers are facing a pre-winter crisis.
It is time for Tortorella to take ownership of that. It is time for Tortorella to take ownership of the Rangers. If he does not, he will never need to worry about having to acknowledge a Garden crowd giving him a standing ovation.