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New York Rangers Game Notes

Rangers vs. Red Wings: Hairless and Beautiful

Road Rangers roll again as Panarin, Lafrenière, and Laba lead the charge. Now they just need to bring that energy home.

Joe Fortunato

Joe Fortunato

— 3 min read
Rangers vs. Red Wings: Hairless and Beautiful
© Tim Fuller-Imagn Images
  • It it astounding how much of a different team the New York Rangers are on the road than they are at home. And actually, I'm not even sure how fair that comment is. Even in the 3-0 loss to Carolina the Rangers played a really solid foundational game and out-chanced their opposition. I guess the major difference is on the road the Rangers can actually score goals, and at home they can't. That has to give at some point, but the silver lining (if you're looking for one) is the team is still playing sustainable hockey at both sides of the spectrum.
  • Still, that was one of the best games I have seen the team play all year—and there have been a lot of good ones despite the record. I can't ever remember seeing a HockeyStatCard that looked like this.
  • I'm not sure if it's a sort of ritual that can only be done in the most dire of circumstances, but if I was Artemi Panarin I would never have a single hair on my body at any point in time. Ever.
  • Panarin was—finally—the best player on the ice for the Rangers, putting up a goal and two assists. For a lovely change he was actually flying at both ends, and playing with some measure of confidence with the puck on his stick. He needed a game like this badly.
  • As did my son, Alexis Lafrenière. Unlike Panarin I've thought (and argued) that Lafrenière's game has been fine, but his finishing and his teammates' finishing hasn't been there. Well, this was another game where Lafrenière played well, only the puck went into the back of the net. He got very lucky Noah Laba finished the feed in front (reversing some of that horrible puck luck), and his breakaway goal was a thing of beauty. He also had a point taken away from him on the disallowed goal.
  • Hopefully that game (and let's also pray it continues tonight against the New York Islanders) quiets some of the noise around those two.

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