The Garden was loud Thursday night, finally given a reason to cheer by the Rangers after they snapped their four-game slide with a crisp 4-1 victory over the Lightning.
It was its loudest in the third period, when Hernik Lundqvist was at his best, drawing familiar but recently rare “Hen-Rik, Hen-Rik” chants and reminding everyone why he won the Vezina Trophy as the league’s best goaltender last year.
After two periods in which he was more of a spectator than a participant — the Rangers outshot Tampa Bay by an astounding 35-11 over that time — Lundqvist was besieged by the buzzing and desperate Lightning. He turned away each chance and allowed second chances, an issue in Tuesday’s loss to the Jets.
“You just have to remind yourself every save, every shot, can change the game,” Lundqvist said after making 23 saves. “Even though I didn’t face much, one mistake and they’re back in it.”
Of the 14 saves he made in the final period, his best was a post-to-post stop on Tampa Bay star center Steven Stamkos to negate a 2-on-1 rush.
“Hank stood tall,” coach John Tortorella said. “He made some big saves for us in that third period.”
It obviously helped Lundqvist to have blue-liners Michael Del Zotto and Ryan McDonagh back in front of him. Yet, he also felt a sense of responsibility to play better. Lundqvist blamed himself for Tuesday’s 4-3 loss to the Jets, for the fourth goal he let in, an Evander Kane shot he said “I need to stop,” that turned a one-goal deficit to two.
“It was an important game for me and an important game for the team as well to step up here,” he said. “I felt personally I needed to play better, and I did. I feel the last couple of weeks it’s been pretty good, I feel my game is coming. … The last one was not good enough. It was important for me to play better and help the team to get a win.”