Mika Zibanejad goal spurs Rangers to 3-2 win against Sharks
After a day of deep reflection regarding his admitted subpar play recently, Mika Zibanejad scored a big goal Thursday to help lift the New York Rangers to a 3-2 win against the San Jose Sharks at Madison Square Garden.
Zibanejad’s score sparked a three-goal second period for the Rangers (10-4-1), who won for the first time this season after allowing the game’s first goal (1-4-1). Jimmy Vesey and Vincent Trocheck also scored for the Rangers and Igor Shesterkin made it stand up by stopping 25 of 27 shots Thursday.
“It was good to help the team, good to score,” Zibanejad said simply postgame.
It wasn’t all good news for the Rangers, though. Filip Chytil was shaken up after a second-period collision with teammate K’Andre Miller, appeared wobbly getting up and headed to the dressing room for medical attention. Chytil returned to take one 61-second shift later in the period, but didn’t play in the third, ruled out with an upper-body injury. With his history of head injuries, there’s plenty of concern for Chytil.
“Day to day. Getting evaluated right now,” Rangers coach Peter Laviolette said postgame.
Timothy Liljegren scored his first goal of the season for the Sharks (5-10-3), who are 1-1-1 three games into a four-game road trip. Fabian Zetterlund added a power-play goal at 19:33 of the third period to make things interesting.
Macklin Celebrini, the No. 1 pick in the 2024 NHL Draft, was held off the score sheet in his Madison Square Garden debut, finishing minus-two with three shots on goal. Mackenzie Blackwood made 32 saves in the loss.
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New York Rangers 3 – San Jose Sharks 2
It wasn’t the best of starts for the Rangers, who allowed four of the game’s first five shots and surrendered the only goal scored in the first period, albeit a fluky one. Liljegren’s left-point shot deflected off the stick of Vesey up and over four players crowded in the slot and landed behind a stunned Shesterkin 2:51 into the game.
New York regrouped and played well defensively the rest of the period, though they also didn’t generate much in the offensive end. There were a pair of 3-on-2 rushes up ice late in the period for the Rangers that required quality saves by Blackwood. The first denied Reilly Smith, the second Ryan Lindgren.
Out-shot 9-7, the Rangers reached the first intermission trailing by one, in part because Sharks forward Carl Grundstrom rang a shot off the crossbar that beat Shesterkin cleanly at 17:50.
The Rangers and Sharks exchanged shots off the post to begin the second period. Zac Jones caught iron with a left-wing shot at 2:16 and William Eklund’s shot from the right circle hit the far post to Shesterkin’s blocker side four minutes later.
The turning point in this one came at 11:41 when Zibanejad buried the rebound of Adam Fox’s right-wing shot to tie the score 1-1. It was his first goal in nine games and third of the season. And it came two days after his miserable minus-four outing against the Winnipeg Jets, when three of his turnovers led directly to goals.
Zibanejad’s goal woke up the Rangers and the Garden crowd. Chytil had a great scoring chance less than a minute later on a spinning backhand shot, and Fox made a terrific diving play at the other end to break up San Jose’s 3-on-1 rush.
Vesey then made it 2-1 by collecting the puck between the circles after his own failed pass and sailed a backhand shot past Blackwood at 13:15. It was Vesey’s second goal in three games.
After an apparent goal by Fox was overturned on video review because Trocheck interfered with Blackwood, the Rangers center made up for his mistake minutes later. Trocheck got behind the defense to redirect a stunning feed from Artemi Panarin high into the net for his fourth goal at 16:21 to give the Rangers a 3-1 lead.
The Rangers missed an opportunity to add to their lead when they failed on a power play to begin the third period. And that lead was nearly cut back to one, but former Rangers forward Barclay Goodrow missed the net on a short-handed breakaway.
The Rangers didn’t allow much in the third period, keeping the pressure off Shesterkin, who had a rare quiet night. Shesterkin did rob Goodrow late with a slick glove save, and added a few more after the Sharks pulled Blackwood for an extra attacker in the final minutes. Zetterlund scored a 6-on-4 power-play goal from the doorstep with 26.2 seconds left to play.
All in all it was a good night for the Rangers, and a solid bounce-back performance after the 6-3 loss to the Jets. But concern about Chytil’s health put a damper on the victory, ahead of their four-game road trip which begins Sunday night against the Seattle Kraken.
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