With four games in six nights coming up before the All-Star break, last night’s 7-0 Garden laugher over the comatose Maple Leafs that was 4-0 after one and 6-0 after two provided the benefit of allowing Rangers coach John Tortorella to get his athletes some rest.
Indeed, with a match tonight in Carolina completing the Blueshirts’ 13th set of back-to-back games with the club’s first 49 games of the season, Marc Staal and Dan Girardi, who invariably are 1-2 (in no particular order) in ice time among defensemen, last night were 6-5.
Staal, who will be matched against his older brother Eric tonight, played 17:27 (4:21 in the third) while Girardi was on for 18:41 (6:26 in the third). Partners Ryan McDonagh and Steve Eminger on the revamped defense each played 21:21 while Matt Gilroy played 19:55 and partner Michael Sauer got 18:47 of ice.
Tortorella was able to limit Marian Gaborik to 17:28, and 4:46 in the third even as the sniper had four goals by the second intermission. Brian Boyle, who scored on a first-period deflection for first power-play goal of his career, played 14:57. Fourth-line components Chris Drury (20:33), Dale Weise (12:53) and Kris Newbury (10:14 plus 17 PIM) saw extra duty in the third.
The coach said he was pleased with his remade defense after switching up his pairs in order to get Eminger back to his natural right side, even though that meant Gilroy would be moving back to his off-side on the left following a lengthy run of games on the right side.
“I don’t think Gilly over thinks which side he’s on,” Tortorella said before the match. “We just felt that Emmy was being blocked from passing and maybe holding it too long on the left side, so we wanted to get him over where he sees the ice better from the right side.
“It also balances our [second and third pairs] in terms of time they’d get.”
Eminger took a nasty chop at 18:03 of the third from Colton Orr that earned the former Ranger a five-minute major for slashing, plus a game misconduct. Eminger was not injured on the play.
“I was nervous all game about Orrsey,” Tortorella said. “I’ll tell [everyone] now, I told our guys not to fight him, just so [everyone] knows.
Í respect Colton Orr, I really do, but I don’t get some of the BS that goes on in the game.”
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The Rangers, who had lost two in a row, avoided first regulation three-game losing streak of season. They had come in 4-4-1 in previous nine, scoring a total of 13 goals, unable to get to three even once. They scored three goals in the first 13:21 and four within 15:40 of last night’s match.
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Marian Gaborik
, who scored four goals, has 10 of his 15 goals in three games (previous hat tricks against the Oilers on Nov. 14 and at the Coliseum on Dec. 2) and has scored all 15 in eight of his 34 games. Just one of Gaborik’s 15 goals has come outside the metropolitan New York region, that his game-tying score with Lundqvist pulled in Tampa on Jan. 1.
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Henrik Lundqvist
‘s seventh shutout ties him for the NHL lead with Boston goaltender Tim Thomas
, the prohibitive favorite to capture the Vezina. The King has five shutouts with a 1.69 goals against average and .940 save percentage in his last 21 games (20 starts).
“Mentally and physically, I feel great,” said Lundqvist, who matched his single season career high in shutouts first established in 2007-08. “I can really feel a big difference.
“It’s not only not playing all the time, there are other changes I’ve made including nutrition and other things. The game is all about details. I’m trying to improve in my attention to all of them to get better.”
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The Rangers announced the recall of 24-year-old winger Chad Kolarik
during the match and the recall of 23-year-old winger Brodie Dupont
following game.
Kolarik, who was obtained from the Columbus organization earlier in the year for Dane Byers
, has 23 points (10-13) in 26 games with the AHL Whale with 33 points (16-17) in 39 AHL games overall. Dupont, selected 66th overall by the Blueshirts in the 2005 Entry Draft, has 20 points (eight goals, 12 assists) in 40 games with the Whale.