Rangers Fall To Islanders 2-1

Apr 6, 2018

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Add some more fuel for the tank, as the Rangers fall to the rival Islanders 2-1. Another loss to a rivalry that has been one sided over the last three seasons, as the Rangers are 1-9-2 against the Isles. This last loss has kept the Rangers to zero wins at the Barclays Center since the Islanders first moved into the building in 2015-16. That’s a whopping six losses in a row.

Before the game, Stan Fischler was honored for his years of service for hockey broadcasts on MSG and others as he participated in the ceremonial puck drop. For the Rangers, Mats Zuccarello returned to the lineup, bumping out David Desharnais.

Then the real puck was dropped and it was the Rangers who scored first, as Kevin Hayes notched a PP goal off a carom that led him to bank in the rebound to put the Rangers up 1-0. This is Hayes’ 25th goal of the season, which is a career high.  Although this has been a lost season, Kevin Hayes has certainly been a bright spot for this Rangers team.

That would be it for the Rangers scoring wise, as Thomas Hickey and Anthony Beauvillier would notch two goals within the span of close to five minutes of each other to give the Islanders the lead in the second period.

In comes Jaroslav Halak, who absolutely dominates versus the Rangers. Halak stopped 34 out of 35 Rangers shots tonight, and has won 8 out of 9 contests that’s he’s played in versus the Rangers. During that period, Halak sustains a  1.61 goals-against average and a .946 save percentage versus the Blueshirts.

Alain Vigneault after the loss…

“We got quite a few pucks at the net but against a goaltender that’s got our number the way their guy has right now, you need to get on the inside,” Rangers coach Alain Vigneault said. “You need to get more traffic and you need to create second opportunities and we didn’t do that well enough.”  Brett Cygralis/NY Post

Even with the switch of Vlad Namestnikov for Ryan Spooner on the first line with Chris Kreider and Mika Zibanejad, the Rangers offense was stymied throughout the night as all of the lines failed to generate any type of offense outside of Kevin Hayes’ power play goal.

The Rangers will play their season finale in Philadelphia at 3PM EDT this upcoming Saturday on NBC.

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