BRAD RICHARDS
Desperate to win.
CAP IT OFF! After an electrifying Game 5 victory Monday night, it’s time for the Rangers to send the Capitals home, says Larry Brooks. (Getty Images)
WASHINGTON — Teams of destiny create their own. It’s time for the Rangers to do that tonight. It’s time for the Rangers to lay down a Game 6 hammer on the Capitals and put an end to this conference semifinal.
This isn’t as much about creating breathing space before the Eastern finals as it is about playing with authority, not allowing a vulnerable opponent to get off the mat and, ultimately, showing the finish required of champions.
It’s about the Rangers picking up not only where they left off in Monday’s memory-making Game 5, 3-2 overtime victory that registered Seven Point Six on the Richards Scale (the time of Broadway Brad’s tying goal was changed yesterday from 19:53 to 19:52 because there were 7.6 seconds showing on the official clock) but from where they had been for most of the night — on the puck, in the Capitals’ faces, below the hash marks, driving with a sense of urgency to Braden Holtby’s net.
“We want the mindset that we’re as desperate as they are,” said Richards, always the coolest customer in the room. “From the first shift, we want to try and get that done right away.”
The power play won it for the Rangers on Monday after the power play came perilously close to losing it, not just by failing to score on their first three man-advantages, but by failing to generate so much as a shot through those six minutes, allowing air to seep from a Broadway balloon ready to pop.
Even if the power play is held off the board, it is imperative for the Rangers to seize the momentum with the man-advantage the way the Capitals did early in Game 4 by testing Henrik Lundqvist with six shots on a power play that started at 2:25, an effort that wiped away the trauma of losing a triple-overtime Game 3 and forced the Blueshirts back on their tired heels for the first 20 minutes.
The Rangers have won two of their last four games, both in overtime and both without holding a third-period lead for so much as a second. It’s a tough way to go, and it’s a route that demands late-game heroics, but that’s what follows with a sum of two first-period goals for the series.
The Blueshirts need more early, they need more of what they brought early on Monday, and they need more from every forward line other than the voracious Richards-Marian Gaborik-Carl Hagelin unit that accounted for 25 of the team’s 78 attempts at net.
The Rangers are under no illusions here about what they have accomplished. They have won seven playoff games. At least four teams win eight every year. That’s half as many as the Rangers need to reach their destination.
When just about everyone was throwing roses at the Rangers yesterday, John Tortorella was the exception. The coach instead was busy tossing brick bouquets their way at a press conference in which he was tossed a series of meatballs.
John Mitchell? “Inconsistent.” Marc Staal: “Can still be better.”
You half expected him to say, “Pizza House!” and walk away from the podium.
“I’m not going to be hugging people left and right,” Tortorella said. “We still have a long way to go.”
If experience is the best teacher, the Rangers have the Game 3/Game 4 lesson as a reference point. There is no chance the Blueshirts will take anything for granted, no chance they will underestimate the task at hand.
No chance they will rest on their laurels, for they are made of thorns.
“We don’t get praised [by the coach] for wins, and that’s a good thing,” said Mike Rupp. “It keeps us level headed.”
Game 5 might have made history, but that’s what it is now — history. It’s time for the Rangers to put on their hard hats, lace up their work boots and lay down the hammer on the Capitals and the Eastern semifinals.