Thursday, October 10, 2013
Ducks 6, Rangers 0: Ugliness Part II
There’s no ways to mince words about this right now. At this point, the Rangers are a bad, very bad, hockey team.
Again, luckily for them, the season is only four games old. But it was an incredibly disappointing display Thursday night at Anaheim as they suffered their second straight blowout loss. The Ducks led by three after a first period in which they outshot the Rangers, 17-3, with the Rangers seemingly committing at least 17 defensive zone turnovers. Though the Rangers outshot the Ducks the rest of the way, it still turned into a 6-0 loss and the Rangers’ first shutout loss of the young season.
The Rangers are now 1-3-0 and that impressive 3-1 win at Los Angeles on Monday night seems ages ago. Especially since the next game is Saturday at St. Louis, where the Blues have started the season by winning three straight home games and outscoring opponents 14-4. The Rangers, meanwhile, have been outscored 20-6, including 15-2 the last two games with Tuesday night’s 9-2 loss at San Jose. Rick Nash, of course, will miss at least Saturday’s game after flying back to New York before Thursday’s game after suffering a head injury on a high shoulder hit from the Sharks’ Brad Stuart on Tuesday.
The Rangers practice today in Anaheim before flying to St. Louis and then, immediately after Saturday’s game, back to New York where they’ll have three practices to go back to the drawing board before facing the Capitals in Washington on Wednesday.
I jotted down some notes watching the loss to the Ducks but the Cliff Notes are the Rangers are not playing responsible enough defense, leaving players open at the crease, for instance, Ryan Getzlaf on the Ducks’ first goal. A lot of that stems from, seemingly, confusion over assignments. For instance, on Teemu Selanne’s goal to make it 2-0, two Rangers chased the puck behind the net, leaving just one lone defender to cover the crease. Not enough.
In addition to missing defensive assignments and not taking care of the puck better - gaffes by both Anton Stralman and Benoit Pouilot in the defensive zone led to the Ducks’ fifth goal.
And, of course, the Rangers had the mother of all screw-ups early in the second period as Pouilot and Del Zotto crashed into each other, Henrik Lundqvist unsuccessfully came way out of the net to clear the puck and the Ducks wound up with two shots at a vacated net, going ahead 4-0 on ex-Senator Jakob Silfverberg’s goal.
In addition to sloppy defensive work, there was some stupidity thrown in for good measure. Derek Dorsett put the Rangers in a four-minute disadvantage by being penalized for instigating and tripping when he fought Bryan Allen in the first period. And Arron Asham, though he was looking to spark the Rangers, who were still in the game at the time, by fighting Patrick Maroon at 5:29 of the first period, put the Ducks on a power play because he took his own helmet off - then was nice enough to take off Maroon’s helmet at Maroon’s behest so Maroon didn’t receive a two-minute minor for removing his own helmet.
Obviously, there will be discussion as to why/how the Rangers have yet to adapt to new coach Alain Vigneault’s defensive system, as being taught by assistant Ulf Samuelsson. Yes, this system does call for different assignments in terms of crease positioning from ex-coach John Tortorella’s method but these are professional hockey players, they should be able to make the adjustment.
My own opinion is that these last two games are the residue from the Rangers’ dysfunctional preseason - all six games on the road, a mini-camp in Banff, four games in five nights necessitating the Rangers take 39 players on the trip, limiting their ability to develop on-ice cohesion amongst their regulars in the preseason.
But there can’t be any excuses. Vigneault simply needs to do a better job coaching and the players need to make more of an effort to get up to speed. Now.
To me, what made this game worse than the 9-2 loss to the Sharks was that, at the morning skate, you heard all the cliched quotes about having pride in playing for the emblem, and wanting to be back on the ice to put that blowout loss behind them, and being excited to show that the 9-2 loss wasn’t the real Rangers, that the 3-1 win over the Kings represented the true team.
And that was all out the window quickly as the Ducks, knowing the Rangers might be fragile after the loss to the Sharks, successfully forechecked and pressured the Rangers into too many early mistakes.
Finally, for the Rangers, if Henrik Lundqvist doesn’t play better, nothing else will matter. Sure, he was left exposed on several of the Ducks’ goals and perhaps the first period score deserved to be 5-0 instead of 3-0. Still, he’s being paid $6.8 million (and possibly seeking $9 million annually) for a reason. He has to bail this team out, starting Saturday in St. Louis.
Not that any positives can be drawn from this stinker but here’s a couple of things that perhaps bode well:
- The Rangers killed off all six of the Ducks’ power plays.
- Unlike the Sharks’ blowout, the Rangers never stopped competing against the Ducks despite the early and large deficit.
- Brad Richards, despite the incompetence on the ice, still looked confident in his game in the third period. Only a nice glove save kept him from scoring his fourth goal in three games. He and Derek Stepan were reunited in the second period.
That’s about all I’ve got.
I’m off to St. Louis this morning so, yes, I’m back with the team after missing the first four games. If the Rangers suddenly start playing well, I’d like some commission for bringing them good luck. I’m still expecting the Rangers to recall either J.T. Miller or Chris Kreider from Hartford (AHL) today.
As for some statistical notes:
- Brian Boyle tied for the team-high with five shots, and led all skaters with 16 faceoff wins (16-21, 76%) in 18:21 of ice time.
- Richards and Ryan Callahan both registered five shots in the contest.
- Dan Girardi and Derick Brassard tied for the game-high with four hits apiece. Girardi also led all skaters with 22:39 of ice time.
- Marc Staal and Ryan McDonagh tied for the team-high with two blocked shots apiece. McDonagh leads the team and is tied for sixth in the NHL with 11 blocked shots on the season.
======================================================
Follow me on Twitter at twitter.com/AGrossRecord
Follow the Record Sports Staff at twitter.com/TheRecordSports