The tally was the breadman’s 14th in the regular season against the Penguins, the most against any opponent in his career. As time ticked down on the first period, Malkin cross-checked Schneider from behind, which earned him a two-minute minor for boarding, and putting New York on the power play where they wasted little time cashing in.Īnticipating Pittsburg’s clearing attempt, Patrick Kane lifted Ryan Poehling’s stick, allowing the puck to hit Adam Fox’a blade, who then found Artemi Panarin on the left side for a snipe with 10 seconds remaining, doubling New York’s lead. While five different Rangers made up the six goals and five players each had multi-point games, the most impressive part of the play from the top two lines was their forechecking and relentless puck retrieval in the neutral zone, making for sustained offensive zone pressure. The offense showed signs of their chemistry coming together in Tuesday’s 5-3 over the Washington Capitals and Thursday’s 4-2 win over the Penguins before Saturday’s explosion. Still, the proclamations hadn’t been backed up by their play until this week. The NHL world has raved about the Rangers’ top six since the trade deadline. It was another splendid all-around performance by the New York center, who added two assists, two hits, a takeaway, and won 52.2% of his faceoffs. New York improved to 5-0-1 in their past six games with their second win in three days over their Metropolitan division rivals and lowered their magic number towards clinching a playoff spot to 13 points with 13 regular season games remaining.įor the 10th time this season, which tied Red Wings’ Dylan Larkin and the Avalanche’s Mikko Rantanen for the league lead, Mika Zibanejad got the scoring started.įollowing a Jacob Trouba shot from the blue line, which hit a ton of traffic, Zibanejad, from the lower left circle, backhanded a puck right past Tristan Jarry at the 5:16 mark for his third consecutive game-opening goal and a 1-0 Rangers lead. Led by a balanced offensive attack and 34 saves from Igor Shesterkin, who recorded his second shutout of the season. In front of a nationally televised audience and a raucous NYC crowd already in a festive mood following the New York Knicks stirring comeback home win over the top-seeded Denver Nuggets earlier in the day, the Blueshirts bludgeoned Pittsburg 6-0. Penguins superstar Evgeni Malkin said the Rangers “Probably have the best team in the league” on Friday before being shown firsthand how that may be true.
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