Rangers steamroll Flames, extend winning streak to four

AP Photo/The Canadian Press, Jeff McIntosh

The New York Rangers took everything the Calgary Flames gave them, which was odd-man rushes, turnovers, and facepalm moments that turned into goals. The Rangers jumped out to a 4-0 lead, scoring twice at even strength, once on the powerplay, and once shorthanded, en route to a 5-2 win. The Rangers weren’t perfect, surrendering a lot of shots and exchanging a lot of chances with Calgary throughout the game. However, goaltending was the big difference, as Calgary’s goaltending is coming crashing back to reality.

Henrik Lundqvist, fresh off the shutout with almost no work in Edmonton, stopped 29 of 31 shots. Rick Nash scored twice, and Derek Stepan and Chris Kreider –each of whom needed to step up their games– added goals as well. Stepan also added an assist on Nash’s second goal, with other assists coming from Martin St. Louis and Dan Girardi. Carl Hagelin added an empty netter.

On to the goals:

Rangers 1, Flames 0

Nash absolutely burned Mark Giordano after Calgary’s dump in wrapped all the way around and out of the Rangers zone. Nash pick up the puck for the semi-breakaway and buried it around Kari Ramo.

Rangers 2, Flames 0

There’s no real breakdown here, it was just a boneheaded play by the Flames and a good job by Kreider to keep playing until the whistle.

Rangers 3, Flames 0

Stepan and Girardi made good plays to force the Flames into a turnover on the powerplay. Stepan was able to start a 2-on-1 with Nash, and fed him a beautiful pass for the shorty.

Just a note: This is the last GIF for the goals. These are west coast games and I’m not going to ask GIFs to be made that late.

Rangers 4, Flames 0

The Rangers dodged a bullet after a bad defensive zone turnover and a Flames crossbar. Sometimes, the Hockey Gods are cruel, and MSL picked up the loose puck after the crossbar and made a great power move along the boards to fight through a check and keep the rush going. After gaining the zone, MSL hit Stepan with a nice pass, and after whiffing on the shot down low, Stepan took the puck around the net and tucked it in with a wraparound. This goal chased Ramo.

Flames 1, Rangers 4

J.T. Miller made a bad pass in the offensive zone, which led to Calgary sustaining offensive pressure for an extended period of time. Eventually Jiri Hudler got free in front, behind Mats Zuccarello, and Giordano’s point shot was deflected under Hank. Kevin Klein followed his man a little too high on the play as well, getting up to the top of the circle a second before the goal.

Rangers 5, Flames 1

Hagelin empty netter.

Flames 2, Rangers 5

With the Flames on the powerplay, Sean Monahan gained the offensive zone while Curtis Glencross cut to the slot. No one picked him up, and Monahan put the puck right on Glencross’ stick for the one-timer over Hank’s glove.

Shift Chart:

It’s tough to gauge matchups when Alain Vigneault doesn’t have the last change. But the ice time was pretty balanced throughout the game, a product of the runaway score. AV rotated all of his guys through the end of the game. The exception is Miller, who was hurt early in the third and returned later in the period.

Fenwick Chart:

This has score effects written all over it. The Flames took off once the Rangers got their four goal lead. It’s worth noting that before that, the possession game was pretty even, but the Flames surrendered much more dangerous chances that the Rangers buried.

Individual Corsi:

More score effects here, as noted above. The Flames are all in the bottom-right part of the chart (good), and most of the Rangers are on the wrong side of the diagonal even line. Miller had that bad turnover that led to the goal, but other than that had a strong game.

Shot Plot:

The Rangers did a good job of limiting rebound chances and keeping the Flames to the perimeter. The Rangers also did a relatively good job of blocking shots from the slot. There were, and always will be, prime scoring chances, but Hank came up big when they needed him.

This was the best case scenario for the Rangers on this three-game west coast swing against the Canadian teams. They beat up on two bad teams and one mediocre team en route to a perfect road trip.

All gifs courtesy of gifgoldmine.com. All charts courtesy of war-on-ice.