The Broadway Hat hung inside Dan Girardi’s locker, solemn and hardly noticed, not perched on the defenseman’s head as a symbol of victory, but stoic in the wake of survival.
The Rangers beat the Flyers Tuesday night, 2-1, in a Garden where the seats are now a little more worn at the edges, the 17,200 inside moaning and groaning throughout the final 20 minutes as the home team did all it could to throw away a two-goal lead with a lack of discipline.
And in doing so, they lost their captain, Ryan Callahan, who exited just over four minutes into the third period with his left arm hanging limp from his shoulder, the result of a fight he was grabbed into by the Flyers’ Max Talbot. The Rangers and coach John Tortorella had no update on Callahan’s status, but he did not return and left in what appeared to be serious pain.
“We rallied around that and tried to build off that,” said Girardi, who spent 27:51 of his night on the ice, 6:57 of it with his team down a man, throwing his body around with utter disregard for his well-being.
“Obviously, there are still some things we need to improve on, but getting two wins in a row here and going for a third, we’re getting back to Ranger hockey for sure.”
So the Blueshirts have now evened their record at 3-3-0, coupling a 5-2 win over the weak Maple Leafs on Saturday with a hard win over a Flyers team that came out in the first two periods distinctly flat. With the Penguins in town tomorrow coming off a disheartening 4-1 home loss to the Islanders, it doesn’t get any easier.
“It doesn’t really matter who we’re playing, we need to play our game,” said goalie Henrik Lundqvist, who was sharp in making 26 saves in his sixth consecutive start to open the season. “That’s what we’ve been doing the past two games. We’ve been more aggressive.”
That aggression almost hurt them when they began the third period up 2-0 behind a goal from Michael Del Zotto and a power play tally from Callahan. In the midst of having his best game of the season, Carl Hagelin prematurely jumped on the ice 6:11 into the period to earn a too-many-men penalty, one that would lead to a Kimmo Timonen goal, which cut the Rangers’ lead in half.
“I focus on the dumbness of Hagelin,” Tortorella said. “He played a hell of a game, but that’s all washed out by the dumbness.”
Skating on a line with Derek Stepan and Callahan, Hagelin had a team-high four shots on goal and had a pearl of a chance on a short-handed breakaway in the third that was stopped by Ilya Bryzgalov (26 saves).
“I think you always want to try and stay positive,” Hagelin said. “I took a bad penalty, and that can’t happen, especially when you’re up 2-0 and then they score on it. That can’t happen, but I obviously learned from that. I’m going to wait longer next time.”
The Rangers did kill off a Flyers’ 5-on-3 power play midway through the second period, which ignited the crowd and got the team reenergized. Two minutes after getting back to even strength, Talbot took a tripping penalty and that’s when Callahan netted what would be the game-winner.
But now Callahan is out, and when he returns is anyone’s guess at this point. After he skated into the locker room, both Marc Staal and Marian Gaborik took tripping penalties, making those waning moments of the game tick off the clock that much slower.
“We have a lot more work to do,” Tortorella said, his anger turned to angst for at least one more night.
bcyrgalis@nypost.com