Flyers whip Rangers to force Game 7

PHILADELPHIA — Now, again, there is only one game, a single contest left for the Rangers to keep their season from falling off the cliff.

With a 5-2 drubbing at the hands of the Flyers in Game 6 of this first-round playoff series on Tuesday night at Wells Fargo Center, the Rangers find themselves with the do-or-die scenario of a decisive Game 7, and they have little time to think about it.

It will be Wednesday night on the Garden ice when the Blueshirts face a summer of indignity or a second round against the Penguins, the season’s success or failure hanging in the balance.

“Game 7s are what brings the best out of people,” said alternate captain Brad Richards. “We’re going home where we’ve had success in Game 7s, especially a lot of these guys in this room. That’s why we battled hard right to the end — to get home ice.”

Ah, yes, the Game 7s of the past, most notably from two seasons ago when Richards and the Rangers went all the way to conference finals, going by route of two Game 7 home-ice wins against the Senators and Capitals, respectively. Yet what got them into those places — and what had them worn down by the time the faced the Devils for a chance to play for the Stanley Cup — was the fact they continued to lose with a chance to take hold of a series.

This loss on Tuesday was the Rangers’ 12th consecutive defeat following a win in which they took a series lead, and it is all the way back in 2008 when they last won a playoff series without needing seven games to do so.

“Playoffs is all about having short memories, so you move on,” said goalie Henrik Lundqvist. “You don’t’ think too much about this game.”

Lundqvist might never think about this game again, as he was replaced by backup Cam Talbot to start the third period with his team already down, 4-0, three of those goals coming from the seemingly dominant Wayne Simmonds. It was the first time the 2012 Vezina Trophy winner had been pulled from a playoff game since Game 6 of the 2009 first round against the Capitals, when he gave up five goals on 20 shots and was subbed out for Steve Valliquette.

“They did pretty much everything better than us, even goaltending,” said Lundqvist, who stopped just 19-of-23 shots, while his counterpart, Steve Mason, was outstanding in making 13 first-period saves, 34 overall. “We have to step up [Wednesday] and try to win this game.”

If that is going to be the case, the Rangers are going to need a lot more from all areas. Their power play was terrible in going 0-for-5 over 9:50. Their penalty kill gave up two goals on three attempts, the worst of which was the game-opener, when Dan Girardi committed a terrible turnover that lead to the first of Simmonds tallies, all of them from within an arm’s distance of the crossbar.

“We couldn’t score,” Richards said, “but we couldn’t do a lot of things.”

At the end of the game, the Rangers might have shown a glimmer of pride, with Brian Boyle getting into a fight with Adam Hall and Mats Zuccarello scoring a goal and then forcing Simmonds to take a 10-minute misconduct when he was a little too close during the subdued celebration. Because that goal had made it 5-2 with 56.5 seconds remaining, and mattered little.

What does matter was just hours away, a quick ride up the Turnpike and under the river and into the center of Manhattan, where the Rangers can either save their season or watch it float off into the summer. When coach Alain Vigneault was asked how he could turn the page quickly going into this familiar situation, he responded with a question he damn well knew the answer to.

“Do we have a choice?” he said.