The Rangers responded to their first serious challenge of the season with their most assertive and complete performance of the year.
They got the puck in deep, they drove to the net, they created and won battles all last night in all three zones. They played with energy, with purpose, and with an intimidating chip on their collective shoulders in a 5-2 Garden victory over the Lightning that ended their two-game losing streak.
“After you lose two, you want to finish your checks, be more assertive and, as Tom [Renney] says, play on our toes, not on our heels,” said Chris Drury, who recorded his second career hat trick on two power-play goals and one short-handed score. “Our specialty teams were very sharp, but I think that was a carryover from the overall way we approached the game.”
The Rangers approached the game hungry. The tempo was set early and often by the Brandon Dubinsky-Nikolai Zherdev-Aaron Voros unit that not only moved the puck well in attacking the net, but, equally as importantly, played bruising, confrontational hockey along the boards, in the corners and in the slot.
Voros, whose game had become too cute the last couple of weeks, was immovable in front of goaltender Mike Smith, who lost his cool as the game evolved and pucks kept getting by him. After whacking Voros across the ankles a couple of times previously, Smith chopped him across the left thigh with the big goal stick late in the third, thus provoking a fight between himself and the winger at 18:19 of the third.
“That last one was a half-Hextall,” Voros said, referring to the notorious Ron Hextall. “You’ve got to stick up for yourself and take care of your own body.”
Renney, who generally declines to speak to fouls committed by the opposition, called upon the NHL to discipline Smith.
“You ordinarily don’t get hurt fighting, but you might get hurt with a spear or a slash to the back of the leg,” Renney said when asked if he was concerned seeing Voros fight the mask-wearing goaltender. “It was completely unprovoked, and I think Smith should be suspended.”
It’s impossible to know what Barry Melrose would have said had he been analyzing the incident for ESPN, but now that he is the Tampa Bay head coach, he laughed off Renney’s suggestion.
“Did Tom say how many games so I should be prepared?” Melrose asked The Post. “No; I disagree whole-heartedly.
“Voros doesn’t go there because he’s a 50-goal scorer. He goes in front for a reason. What happened is just part of the battle.”
The battle was everything for the Rangers following too many games in which they were too passive on both sides of the puck. They won the puck, they got into open ice and spread out the Lightning on the rush. They played with snarl that paid off in, among other tangibles, a 3-for-8 PP performance.
“We felt that the last game [2-1 loss to the Islanders] was a big test, and it was very frustrating that we weren’t better in that one,” said Henrik Lundqvist, so sharp yet again. “So we knew that we really needed this one.”
They needed it, and they went out and took it. Good show.