Rangers Won’t Beat Panthers if They Don’t Tighten Up Defensively

Kreider’s natural hat trick in a nine-minute span of the third that rallied the Blueshirts from a 3-1 deficit to a 5-3 win May 16 stands as one of those seminal occurrences that championship teams pull off on their run to a title. The hard truth, though, is that the Rangers were more than a little lucky be in position for Kreider’s three-goal burst to matter after they showed serious cracks defensively for the two games and two periods that followed the Rangers grabbing a 3-0 series lead.

With the Rangers still down two goals in Game 6, there were two hit posts behind Igor Shesterkin, those coming on glorious chances from in close. There was a break-in by Sebastian Aho on which he somehow missed the net altogether. Jordan Staal was then all alone with the puck in front, with Shesterkin making a brilliant save. Any of the three plays could have given the Hurricanes a three-goal lead in the third. And finally, there was Andrei Svechnikov taking advantage of an incomprehensible breakdown off a faceoff to nearly tie it with under three minutes remaining, only to be stoned by Shesterkin on another incredible stop.

Rangers’ Season Was in Danger Before Kreider Took Over Third Period

That’s not to mention a number of other Grade-A scoring chances against. Yet the Rangers survived and advanced, thanks to Shesterkin. The surviving part, however, was the prevailing theme, and chances are that that won’t fly when the competition gets even tougher in the next round that starts May 22.

The issues surfaced in Game 4, when the Blueshirts’ sloppy, unfocused start resulted in a 3-1 first-period deficit en route to a 4-3 loss. A nightmarish third period in Game 5, in which the Hurricanes scored four goals in an eventual 4-1 victory, was marked by numerous lapses in their own end.

All of that carried over to Game 6, with the tide progressively building against the Rangers until Kreider took advantage of one of Carolina’s Achilles’ heels – goaltending – and knocked in a puck past Freddie Andersen that should have been stopped, igniting the stunning comeback and series-clinching victory.

To put it bluntly, good luck with that against the next opponent. The Panthers’ forward core is just too good for those kinds of errors to go unpunished. The Rangers are going to have to significantly tighten it up, and fast.

“It was just that we knew that wasn’t the way we need to play in order to win hockey games in the playoffs against teams like that,” center Vincent Trocheck said after Game 6. “We just had to go out there and make a decision in the third period and either show up and play and be a part of the series or don’t. I think we had 20 guys show up in the third.”

Trocheck is dead on, and the Rangers will have to show up for more than just one period from here on out. Events that can no longer occur with any regularity if they want to reach the Stanley Cup Final: Horrendous line changes, like the one in Game 5 that left Staal one-on-one with a flat-footed Braden Schneider, who couldn’t prevent Staal from tying the game at 1. Huge mental lapses, like Will Cuylle deciding to go for a skate up ice rather than covering his man Svechnikov on the late defensive-zone faceoff in Game 6, leaving Svechnikov with the puck on his stick in front and only Shesterkin to beat. Poor decisions with the puck, like bad passes and clearing attempts that resulted in numerous turnovers against the aggressive Hurricanes.

Yes, Carolina plays a unique, man-on-man style designed to pressure opponents all over the ice and generate the kinds of turnovers it forced against the Rangers. Yes, the Hurricanes are a volume-shooting team that prefers to put the puck on net rather than wait for plays to develop, leading to ugly shot disparities. Yes, NHL playoff series these days rarely go the way of the Blueshirts’ first-round series against the overmatched Washington Capitals, when it was apparent early on that the Rangers advancing was only a matter of time. There’s almost always pushback, which Carolina delivered in spades before Kreider’s career performance.

Regardless, counting on Shesterkin to constantly bail them out, as the Rangers often did with Henrik Lundqvist throughout his exquisite career, wasn’t a championship strategy then and it isn’t now. It’s time for the Blueshirts – who asked for more structure to their approach in exit interviews last offseason, got it from new coach Peter Laviolette and his staff and mostly bought into what Laviolette preached – to re-embrace those lessons as they travel deeper into the playoffs. A look back at the Washington series should provide a strong refresher course, as they defended hard and with physicality in keeping many of the Caps’ chances to the outside during the four-game sweep.

Fox’s Quiet Series Seems Indicative of Health Issues

There’s at least one troubling factor that isn’t a matter of on-ice improvements. Star defenseman Adam Fox clearly wasn’t 100 percent against the Hurricanes, his usual jump on the power play and in his own zone absent – perhaps the result of the leg-on-leg hit from Washington’s Nic Dowd in Game 4 of that series, or the rumored flu-like illness that has moved through the Rangers’ dressing room, or both. Whatever the case, Fox, who was limited to two assists in the six games, and consistent partner Ryan Lindgren were the team’s worst defensive pair against Carolina, recording an expected goal share of just 46.2 percent.

For a duo that almost always drives positive play for the Blueshirts, that number is alarming. The Rangers need Fox, who took two maintenance days before the series in a major red flag, to rest up and get healthy – as healthy as possible, at least – before the puck drops on the East Final.

The Rangers, who have made comebacks a hallmark of their Presidents Trophy-winning season, will be better off for those final 20 minutes against the Hurricanes as they go forward. Overcoming adversity builds resilience and confidence that you can do it again, and the Blueshirts have been doing it all season, rallying to win a league-high 28 times in the regular season and five times in the playoffs. And there were plenty of positives that came out of the second round: Continued elite special-teams play, their big guns carrying the load when it mattered, outdoing the Hurricanes at 5-on-5, Shesterkin playing like his all-world self.

Yet despite all of that and the exhilarating series win, the room for necessary improvement on defense is considerable. Florida, which eliminated the Boston Bruins in Game 6 on May 17, scored five or six goals four times in the first two rounds. The Rangers simply can’t afford to open it up against the reigning Eastern Conference champs – as they did unintentionally too many times in the Carolina series – and expect to get the same result.

The Blueshirts will of course welcome more playoff heroics in their next series – and beyond, if there’s another series after this one. They’re exciting and unforgettable. However, considerably more boring elements, like blocked shots, crisp defensive zone exits and less action for Shesterkin, are more necessary elements for the Rangers, who know it’s a bad strategy to consistently count on efforts like Kreider’s to get them to where they want to go – the Canyon of Heroes, sometime next month.