Rangers Come Up Empty Against Ottawa Senators
After Friday’s win over the Philadelphia Flyers, the New York Rangers followed it up with an extremely disappointing effort tonight against the Ottawa Senators. The Rangers came up empty on offense, and a large part of that was because of Ottawa’s in the neutral zone. They completely eliminated the Rangers speed from the game, which made for an easy night for Craig Anderson.
While the Rangers did register 33 total shots in the game, a majority of them came from the outside. There were several chances were the Rangers were able crack the Senators defense, but Anderson was there to put out the fire as the last line of defense.
If you were watching this game tonight, there was very little excitement in terms of action with the Senators shutting the game down defensively. After a scoreless first period, the Senators were able to add on their only two goals during the second period.
Jean-Gabriel Pageau picked up the first goal off of a miscue in front of the net, which left Pageau wide open for the tap in. Kevin Klein wound up drifting to the corner with the puck behind the net, and Pageau deflected home Tom Pyatt’s centering feed. Nearing the end of the period, the Senators doubled up their lead with a goal coming from Mark Stone.
Just prior to the goal, the Senators caught a bit of a fortunate bounce with the puck deflecting off of the referee on an attempted clearing attempt. The puck wound up going right to Mark Stone after the deflection, and he snapped it past Antti Raanta for the 2-0 lead.
The Rangers attempted a push back later on in the third period, but the Senators stifling defense restricted them from getting any high-quality chances. Following tonight’s disappointing loss, the Rangers will look to rebound on Tuesday night as they head into Raleigh for a meeting with the Carolina Hurricanes.