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Tag: Henrik Lundqvist

Blogs • Rangers

Mar 24, 2014

The Real Stretch Run for the Rangers

There are 10 games left in the Rangers’ season and the next three weeks will be the difference in the Rangers making the playoffs or in me hate-watching the playoffs this spring.

It seems like just yesterday I turned to the start of the Rangers’ season to console me after the Yankees ended the their season without a trip to the postseason and the Giants were off to an 0-4 start. The Rangers didn’t exactly make me forget about an 85-win Yankees team or a winless Giants team as they lost seven of their first 10 games and were shut out four times in those 10 games. But since that 3-6-0 road trip to open the season and the 2-0 loss to the Canadiens in the home opener in Game 10, the Rangers have been a pretty good team (they are 36-22-4 since the 3-7-0 start).

At times they have made me believe they are capable of competing against the Bruins or Penguins in a seven-game series and at other times they have made me think they will miss the playoffs in a Game 82-shootout setting like they did to finish the 2009-10 season. I have learned not to be surprised by the Rangers over the years and even with a team that rosters Henrik Lundqvist, Rick Nash, Martin St. Louis and Brad Richards, I’m still not surprised by the inconsistent efforts.

After losing back-to-back road games to Carolina and Minnesota (and scoring only one goal in each game), it seemed Rangers fans would have to endure the usual March charades from the Rangers that would force them to play for their season in the final week of the season. With Columbus continuing to win and Philadelphia laughing at the gauntlet portion of their schedule that was supposed to keep them from making a playoff push, the dreaded “Games in hand” phrase that always seems to work against the Rangers at this time of the year began to make its annual appearance on every TV graphic. But over the last five games, the Rangers have looked more like that team that is capable of competing with the Bruins and Penguins and less like the team that let their season come down to an Olli Jokinen shootout attempt.

Three weeks from today the 2013-14 regular season will be over, and three weeks from today there’s a chance the 2013-14 Rangers’ season will be over too. The Rangers have 10 games to earn their way into the playoffs and to make sure I’m not hate-watching the NHL playoffs during my favorite time of the year. In those 10 games, we will get the answer to a few questions I have about the state of the Rangers down the stretch.

Are We in the Middle of One of Rick Nash’s Patented Streaks?
Rick Nash has played 99 regular-season games for the Rangers. He has scored 44 goals in those 99 games. That looks like steady production and without watching him you might think he is a model for consistent goal scoring in the NHL. But while Nash’s final numbers will look the way his final numbers have looked since he entered the league over a decade ago, he is anything but consistent, which makes him the perfect Ranger.

Let’s look at Nash’s 2012-13 regular season:

In seven games from Jan. 19 to Jan. 31, Nash had one goal.

In 12 games from Feb. 2 to March 8, Nash had eight goals.

In eight games from March 10 to March 24, Nash had one goal.

In eight games from March 26 to April 8, Nash had seven goals.

In nine games from April 10 to April 27, Nash had four goals.

And now let’s look at what Nash has done this season:

In 11 games from Nov. 21 to Dec. 10, Nash had six goals.

In 11 games from Dec. 12 Jan. 4, Nash had one goal.

In 11 games from Jan. 6 to Jan. 26, Nash had 11 goals.

In 15 games from Jan. 29 to March 16, Nash had two goals.

In the last three games, Nash has three goals.

Nash has admitted he is a streaky goal scorer and this season, like last, has once again shown that. His 23 goals have come from two 11-game stretches with the rest of them coming in this current three-game streak. Nash scores in spurts and when he does, they aren’t usually in short spurts like three games. They are usually for a couple of weeks. The Rangers need an extended Nash scoring streak that continues through the end of the regular season and into the postseason, which is what didn’t happen last year. (More on that later.)

And how about Nash even deciding to mix it up in his Columbus homecoming? When I told David Singer, founder of HockeyFights.com, on our podcast last week that the Rangers were going to need to get tougher and some Rangers would need to appear on his site in the coming weeks to make the playoffs, I didn’t mean Rick Nash. But Nash has proven to be a leader for this team and it his decision to become one on the ice and the scoresheet couldn’t have come at a better time.

How is Anton Stralman Still in the NHL?
It’s scary to think if John Moore wasn’t currently battling a concussion that Antron Stralman would still be in the lineup. If you’re Raphael Diaz, who is only playing because of Moore’s concussion, you have to be thinking that you’ll never get into a game as long as Moore, Stralman, Ryan McDonagh, Dan Girardi, Marc Staal and Kevin Klein are healthy.

Prior to Moore’s concussion, Stralman was still dressing and still part of the Top 6 defensemen on the team despite doing nothing and I mean actually nothing to earn or deserve to be in the lineup. He has become the new Michael Del Zotto of the Rangers (who is having his own trouble staying in the lineup in Nashville) in that he isn’t an offensive defenseman (or at least he doesn’t produce like one) and he clearly isn’t a defensive defenseman since I would consider him the biggest defensive zone liability in the entire NHL.

Stralman hasn’t looked like an NHL player since the Olympic break and nowhere near the type of player that should be considered for an extension. He hasn’t even been the type of player that should be involved in contract extensions rumors (whether true or false) the way he was a few weeks ago. If Raphael Diaz is back out of the lineup once Moore is back and Stralman doesn’t see the press box for at least one game then there’s a serious problem. And if you see Diaz in line to buy beers between periods at MSG as a healthy scratch, let him know he’s doing the right thing.

Is Martin St. Louis Ever Going to Score?
In 10 games with the Rangers, Martin St. Louis’ production line looks like something Brian Boyle would post: 0-3-3. If you believe in being snake-bitten, then St. Louis is certainly that. And if you believe in being due, then St. Louis is certainly that as well.

During the playoffs last year, the Rangers got past the Capitals in the quarterfinals despite getting just two assists from Rick Nash in seven games. If the Rangers could overcome a 2-0 series deficit and eventually win a Game 7 without their best player scoring a goal, I thought they would be able to make another conference finals appearance and possibly even a Cup appearance once Nash got hot and started scoring, since he would have to get hot and start scoring eventually … right? Wrong. Against the Bruins, Nash had one goal and two assists in the five-game series loss and if it weren’t for Tuukka Rask giving the Rangers the weirdest/craziest goal of all time in Game 4 (and possibly betting against his team in the game), the Rangers would have been swept thanks to a lack of scoring from their pure scorer and too much scoring on his own net from Dan Girardi.

Now even though my theory about Nash eventually getting hot and carrying the Rangers never came to fruition last May, I’m putting it out there again, only this time it’s for St. Louis. At some point, St. Louis is going to get hot and start scoring. His 976 points in 1,051 regular-season games and 68 points in 63 playoff games tell us he’s going to. I just hope his “due” isn’t supposed to come in the playoffs and we never get to experience it because his lack of production over the final 10 games keeps the Rangers out of the playoffs.

Is Henrik Lundqvist Playing for the Rest of the Season?
Before the season, Alain Vigneault said he wanted to keep Henrik Lundqvist to 60 games. Lundqvist has played 55 games so far and that would mean he would only play five of the remaining 10 games, and that’s not going to happen. And I’m fine with it.

Here is how many games Lundqvist has played in each season of his career and how many he didn’t play in:

2012-13: 43/5
2011-12:  62/20
2010-11: 68/14
2009-10: 73/9
2008-09: 70/12
2007-08: 72/10
2006-07: 70/12
2005-06: 53/29

With 10 games left and the Rangers trying to make the playoffs let alone trying to not be a wild-card team, I’m not sure Vigneault can start Cam Talbot until the Rangers have the “x” next to their name in the standings representing a playoff berth has been clinched. And really how can you give Lundqvist a night off when he is 6-2-0 and has allowed just 11 goals in those eight games since March 7?

Maybe when Vigneault said he would try to limit Lundqvist’s starts he thought his Rangers team wouldn’t be fighting for a playoff spot over the final 10 games of the season (if he thought this then he clearly wasn’t in tune with what was going on in New York while he was in Vancouver). But now Vigneault has no choice but to play and ride Lundqvist down the stretch, and in his first season he learned you can’t try to plan ahead for how you will or won’t use Lundqvist over the course of a season.

Once again the Rangers getting to the playoffs will come down to Henrik Lundqvist. I guess I wouldn’t want it any other way since it’s the only way I know.

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Podcasts • Rangers

Mar 11, 2014

Podcast: 610 Barstool Sports New York

610 of Barstool Sports New York joins me to talk about if the Rangers are better now than they were before the trade deadline and how Ryan Callahan didn’t think the Rangers would call his bluff and actually trade him.

A week ago, Ryan Callahan was the captain of the Rangers and trying to work out a deal to make him a career Ranger. Now the Rangers are without a captain, Callahan is playing for the Tampa Bay Lightning and we are four games into the Martin St. Louis era in New York.

610 of Barstool Sports New York joined me to talk about if the Rangers are better now than they were before the trade deadline, how Ryan Callahan didn’t think the Rangers would call his bluff and actually trade him and if Brad Richards can avoid a buyout now that his old teammate is his new linemate.

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Podcasts • Rangers

Mar 3, 2014

Podcast: Kevin DeLury

Kevin DeLury of The New York Rangers Blog joins me to talk about whether the Rangers should sign or trade Ryan Callahan and why Glen Sather is deciding to draw the line for the first time with his team’s captain.

The clock is ticking on Ryan Callahan and the Rangers. With Wednesday’s 3 p.m. deadline quickly approaching, I realize that at any moment I can open Twitter and see that the Rangers have signed Callahan to a six-year deal or that they have traded him, which would send a confusing message to the rest of the Rangers and the fans of the team. But after what has now been a month of trade rumors surrounding Callahan, we will soon have a resolution.

Kevin DeLury of The New York Rangers Blog joined me to talk about whether the Rangers should sign or trade Ryan Callahan, why Glen Sather is deciding to draw the line for the first time with his team’s captain and how far the Rangers can go this season.

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Blogs • Email Exchanges • Rangers

Feb 27, 2014

The Break Is Over for the Rangers and Blackhawks

The Rangers begin the post-break schedule and stretch run of the season against the Blackhawks and that calls for an email exchange with Tab Bamford of Committed Indians.

The break is finally over. After 20 days without Rangers hockey, the Blueshirts return from the Olympic break without their leading scorer, but with three challenging games over the next four days. The Rangers host the Blackhawks on Thursday, head south to see the Flyers on Saturday and then back home to play the Bruins on Sunday. Now that there are just 23 games left in the season, we are officially in the stretch run and it all starts against the defending champions.

With the Rangers and Blackhawks playing for the second and last time this year, I did an email exchange with Tab Bamford of Committed Indians to talk about Patrick Kane’s performance in the Olympics, if Blackhawks fans trust Corey Crawford and what it’s like to be on top of the hockey world.

Keefe: The Olympics are over and they didn’t end the way I wanted them to for Team USA and that’s because they couldn’t score enough or actually when it came to playing Canada or Finland, they couldn’t score at all.

Patrick Kane is the face of hockey in the United States. He is the best American-born player in the NHL and was the best player on the 2014 version of Team USA. It was Kane who everyone turned to control and carry Team USA’s offense in the Olympics and lead them offensively to the gold-medal game, but he never got going. Kane seemed to hit a rough stretch just as the Olympics began and appeared to be in a funk and snake-bitten when it came to breakaways, penalty shots and shootouts as well as a couple of shots that were inches away from tying the semifinal game against Canada. But I’m sure Kane will have his goal-scoring abilities back when the NHL returns and the Blackhawks visit Madison Square Garden on Thursday night, and I wouldn’t be surprised if he had the Patrick Kane-type of game we expected in the Olympics against the Rangers.

It’s disappointing that Kane wasn’t his usual self in Sochi because had he been, Team USA could have gotten past Canada and could have ended the now 34-year drought since this country’s last gold medal. But he shared his frustration with the media after the loss to Finland and looked like one of a few Team USA players that wanted to be playing in the bronze-medal loss.

Are you disappointed with Kane’s performance in the Olympics and him missing out on the chance to become a bigger name and face for the game?

Bamford: Not at all. If you look around that USA roster, there were plenty of guys not pulling their weight, especially at the center position. Kane, like Zach Parise, needed to be a bigger part of the scoring, but Team USA simply didn’t have the horses to put together two or three quality lines that could generate consistent offense.

Keefe: Henrik Lundqvist is now in his ninth season in the NHL and out of the eight prior seasons, Lundqvist has been to the playoffs seven times, losing in the first round three times, the second round three times and the conference finals once. Any success the Rangers have had in the post-lockout era can be attributed to Lundqvist, but here in New York, casual fans or Islanders and Devils fans like to cite his Cup-less career as a reason why Lundqvist isn’t what his stats suggest, despite playing at a Vezina-worthy level since his rookie season.

I always say if the Blackhawks had Henrik Lundqvist as their goalie, it’s scary to think of the type of record they would have and the type of dynasty they could build. If the Blackhawks can have the type of regular season they had last year and then the postseason they had, winning their second Cup in four years, with Corey Crawford, it’s hard to imagine what they could do with someone like Lundqvist.

Last year in the playoffs it seemed like the Blackhawks’ biggest concern, especially in the Final against the Bruins, was how Crawford would play. Do you trust Crawford in net after having now won, or is goaltending still a concern for Blackhawks fans?

Bamford: I trust the Blackhawks’ group of defensemen and the combination of Crawford and Antti Raanta to be good enough … and that’s the key. Crawford has his moments of Vezina-caliber brilliance and others that leave you wondering how the hell he ever made an NHL roster. But, for the most part, he’s been good enough to win games. He was overused and banged up early this season and how he performs down the stretch will be important.

Keefe: I went to college in Boston and know a lot of people that were either at Game 6 of the Stanley Cup Final or were watching it with the belief that the Bruins were forcing a Game 7 in the final couple minutes back in June.

What were the emotional changes like at the end of Game 6 and those 17 seconds that changed hockey history? Going from looking at a Game 7 at home for the Cup to looking at overtime to either win the Cup or go to that Game 7 to looking at winning the Cup so quickly must have been hard to handle.

Bamford: Truthfully, I think there was a lot of disbelief on both benches. To have an empty-net and tie the game is one thing, but to score again 17 seconds later to pull ahead in any game is almost unfathomable, much less in a Stanley Cup-clinching game.

Keefe: The last time the Rangers won the Stanley Cup I was in second grade. It will be 20 years this June since the Rangers beat the Canucks in seven games and the MSG Network is running out of storylines to overkill into making documentaries about from that season. The Rangers need to start making new memories since their best memories in the last 20 years are losing to Flyers in the 1996-97 conference finals and losing to the Devils in the 2011-12 conference finals.

Prior to the Blackhawks winning the Cup in 2009-10, they hadn’t been to the finals since 1991-92 and hadn’t won it all since 1960-61. But after almost 50 years without winning the Cup, the Blackhawks have now won it twice in the last four years.

What is it like to be on top of the hockey world, for someone who forgets what that feels like or means? As a Yankees fan, I have never bought into the idea of a grace period and treat every season as if the Yankees haven’t won the World Series in decades. When it comes to Blackhawks, do you believe in a grace period or would you be devastated if the season ended any other way than with the Cup back in Chicago?

Bamford: It’s surreal. You talk about the Rangers drought … the Hawks hadn’t won the Cup since 1961 before 2010. But, beyond the lack of a championship, the Blackhawks hadn’t even been relevant in almost a full generation. After they burned down a roster loaded with Hall of Famers like Chris Chelios, Ed Belfour, Steve Larmer, Denis Savard and Jeremy Roenick, fans in Chicago were left with a team that was ranked the worst in professional sports (not just hockey) by Forbes less than five years before they hoisted the Cup.

Any fan that’s been around the team for longer than five years will tell you it didn’t make sense that they were champions for a while in 2010 because of how far they had come in such a short amount of time. They were among the last place teams in wins, attendance, revenue, All-Star and postseason appearances. They couldn’t get a call back from an agent, much less sell season tickets. Now there’s a waiting list for tickets that’s thousands of names deep. In a town that had the Cubs, White Sox and Hawks all down for so long, having the Hawks rise to the top has been a wonderful experience for fans.

Keefe: I attended the Rangers-Blackhawks game in Chicago in January. It was my first time in Chicago and my first time at the United Center and it was an awesome experience that was made even better by the Rangers’ 3-2 win.

In that game, the Rangers led 2-0 after the first, but blew that lead (which came as no surprise), before Carl Hagelin broke the tie in the third. It was an encouraging win, beating the defending champions in their building, and since that game, the Rangers have gone 10-4-0 and have positioned themselves as the current 2-seed in the Metropolitan.

Before the break, the Rangers were playing their best hockey of the year (with the exception of a 2-1 home loss to the Oilers on Feb. 6). Now with what will have been 20 days off between games and without Mats Zuccarello for the next few weeks, I’m not sure what to expect from the Rangers as they return from the break.

What kind of game do you expect on Thursday night and are you concerned with how the Blackhawks will play coming off the break?

Bamford: It’s hard to know what to expect out of either of these teams with the number of Olympians returning to the ice. For Chicago, there’s looking back at the Olympics and forward to Saturday night’s outdoor game against Pittsburgh as distractions surrounding a big game against a quality opponent at MSG. The first five minutes to begin the game and the last 10 minutes of the third period will show us a lot about how ready both of these teams are for the home stretch.

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Podcasts • Rangers

Feb 26, 2014

Podcast: Ryan Brandell

Ryan Brandell of Barstool Sports Chicago joins me to talk about how winning has changed the perception of the Blackhawks in Chicago and why the Blackhawks can’t miss out on their current opportunity to create a Yankees-like dynasty.

The Rangers have 23 games in their season and there’s a good chance for most of those they won’t have Ryan Callahan or Dan Girardi. With the trade deadline looming, it looks like the Rangers are going to have to at least move their captain and on top of that, the team is fighting to stay in the playoff picture. The Rangers return from the break with three games in four days and the first game is against the Stanley Cup defending champion Blackhawks.

Ryan Brandell of Barstool Sports Chicago (known as “Chief” on that site), joined me to talk about Patrick Kane’s performance in the Olympics, how winning has changed the perception of the Blackhawks in Chicago and why the Blackhawks can’t miss out on their current opportunity to create a Yankees-like dynasty.

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