Rangers ride Panarin, Shesterkin to 5-2 victory against archrival Islanders
The New York Rangers used their winning formula from last season, special teams and Igor Shesterkin’s goaltending, to defeat the New York Islanders 5-2 on Sunday at Madison Square Garden in their first meeting of the season against their archrivals.
Artemi Panarin led the way offensively with two goals, and Mika Zibanejad contributed three assists for the Rangers, now 8-2-1. Shesterkin was terrific in a 35-save performance as he defeated longtime friend Ilya Sorokin, who made 35 saves for the Isles. Casey Cizikas and Brock Nelson were the only Islanders to score against Shesterkin, who improved to 6-2-1.
Unlike their previous game, a 2-1 win against the Ottawa Senators on Friday that saw the Rangers win despite being outshot 41-18, coach Peter Laviolette was pleased with all aspects of his team’s performance.
“Overall I was happy with all three periods,” said Laviolette, who changed up some of his line pairings after Friday. “I thought 5-on-5, the power play and penalty kill was pretty good.
“Did [Shesterkin] have to make some saves? Yeah. Was he good? Yes. But not like three of the last four games where I felt it was just one-sided. I felt like we were punching and punching. Yeah, we’re going to get punched once in a while too, but overall I thought it was a much better performance. I thought it was way better (than Friday) … The quality of the chances, I thought it was less.”
The Islanders (4-6-2) made Shesterkin work, but they’ve had trouble scoring all season. That didn’t change Sunday, when they were missing top-line forwards Anthony Duclair and Mathew Barzal as well as three of their top-six defensemen. The Rangers’ special teams produced a power-play goal and a short-handed goal while the Isles were 0-for-5 with the extra man.
The first period was a goaltending duel between Sorokin and Shesterkin, who are rivals on the ice but best friends off it.
“Every game is important,” Shesterkin said. “He did a great job tonight, made a lot of huge saves.”
The Rangers struck first at 3:44 when Chris Kreider notched a shorthanded goal off a beautiful give-and-go with Zibanejad. Kreider’s goal was his seventh of the season and the 11th shorthanded tally of his career, the most in the NHL since the 2021-22 season.
The Rangers nearly made it 2-0 a few seconds later, but Sorokin came up with a fabulous save to deny Reilly Smith and keep the score at 1-0.
Shesterkin’s best stop in the first period came with less than nine minutes to go when he denied Islanders defenseman Noah Dobson on a breakaway.
The Rangers made it 2-0 at 1:21 of the second period when Vincent Trocheck scored his third goal of the season and the 200th of his career. Smith stripped the puck from Isles defenseman Samuel Bolduc, one of the injury replacements, and fed Trocheck, who beat Sorokin from the slot.
Shesterkin stopped Bo Horvat on another breakaway. However, Cizikas got the Islanders on the board at 4:38 after a rare errant play by Shesterkin, who allowed a rebound on Pierre Engvall’s easy wrister and was defenseless when Cizikas crashed the net and banged in the loose puck.
But the Rangers’ power play came through at 11:04 when Panarin’s seeing-eye wrist shot from the high slot got past a screened Sorokin to make it 3-1.
Sorokin continued to keep the Islanders in the game with several outstanding saves, including a desperation glove stop to deny Alexis Lafrenière.
The Islanders got within 3-2 with eight seconds left in the period when Kyle Palmieri set up Nelson in front of the net. The 12-year veteran converted for his fifth goal of the season, giving the visitors a spark entering the third period.
The third period began with both Russian netminders remaining in top form. Nelson hit the post on a 2-on-1 break and Horvat got in alone, but Shesterkin was up to the challenge.
Adam Edstrom deflected a shot past Sorokin at 5:18 to make it 4-2 and give Shesterkin some breathing room. The Islanders kept pushing, but Shesterkin made excellent stops on Horvat and Nelson to preserve the two-goal lead.
Coach Patrick Roy pulled Sorokin with just under four minutes to play, but Panarin hit the empty net from deep in his own zone at 16:37 to wrap up the win.
“It was one of our most solid games all season,” Zibanejad said. “I can look at it in a way where we have a record of 8-2-1 and we think we can play better. I would say that’s a good problem to have.”
The Rangers are off until Thursday, when the Buffalo Sabres come to the Garden.
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