Well just like Kreider said, it would've been nicer to get the win in the game where he scored his 50th goal of the season but nevertheless, CHRIS KREIDER IS A 50 GOAL SCORER. The goal wouldn't be enough to get the Rangers back in the game but overall, the team played pretty well, just falling short a goal prior to the empty net. A quick start to the third period would give Carolina the edge but the highlight of the night still goes to Chris Kreider. For the first time in his career, Chris Kreider hits the 50 goal mark in a season, which is even more impressive when you account for the fact that prior to this season, he never even broke the 30 goal mark.
Kreider now joins, Jaromir Jagr, Adam Graves and Vic Hadfield as the fourth player in Rangers history to score 50 goals in a single season. Some pretty good company that includes two guys with numbers hanging in the rafters of MSG. Kreider also becomes the eighth player in league history to hit that milestone for the first time in his 10th season or later as well as the fourth skater to do it for the first time at 50 years or old. He tied Walt Tkaczuk for the eleventh most goals in team history at 227 and becomes the fifteenth player in league history to record 50 or more goals and 25 or more power play goals in a season, the first since Alex Ovechkin did it back in 2015.
Quite the night for the history books, all of those stats courtesy of NYR Stats & Info on Twitter. With eight games remaining this season, Kreider has a very real chance to pass Jaromir Jagr at 54 for most goals in a season in franchise history. After the season he's had, I'm sure it's one of those things where he would be honored if it happens but won't lose sleep if he doesn't. Even in last night's post game Kreider had very little to say about himself, thanking his teammates for all the support, joking about how they can go back to shooting the puck now that they won't be looking for him to hit the 50 mark. When asked if he ever dreamed of scoring 50 goals in a season, he was quick to say he "dreamed of winning a Stanley Cup".
As for the rest of the game, it wasn't a bad effort on the Rangers front, the Hurricanes just continued getting strong chances throughout the night and took advantage of them early in the third period. On the Rangers end, K'Andre Miller had himself a heck of a night, scoring the first goal of the game in the second period and had a couple of great chances following that, one of which coming on a highly skilled, partial breakaway in the third. Andrei Svechnikov tied it up for the Hurricanes off an unfortunate bounce later in the period to head into the third tied at one.
Seth Jarvis kicked the third period off by taking advantage of a giveaway and buried a backhander on the breakaway. About five minutes later, Jordan Staal shot the puck through traffic in front that Shesterkin may have been screened on to give the Canes an insurance goal. Gallant pulled Shesterkin with ample time to get back in the game and Kreider's goal at 18:22 certainly gave them the chance. However, they couldn't generate enough offense in the final minute and Sebastian Aho would put this one away with an empty netter with six seconds remaining.
NYR Game Day @ Philadelphia Flyers 4/13/2022
Luckily, the Rangers will have a quick turnaround to get back on track as they head to Philadelphia for their last visit with the Flyers this season. The Rangers are 2-0-1 against the Flyers this year, most recently falling to them in a shootout just a few weeks ago. Both teams are coming off playing last night so there shouldn't be much of an excuse for the Rangers to not come out on top of this one. The Flyers lost 9-2 last night and are 3-7 in their last ten games. Among the worst teams in the league for goals for, against and special teams, on paper the Rangers have every advantage going into this one.
Carter Hart got the start in Washington last night but was relieved by Martin Jones so it'll be interesting to see which one of them gets the start against Alexandar Georgiev tonight. Jones will likely get the nod as intended considering he played rather well in the Flyers last outing with the Blueshirts. On the Rangers end, tonight wouldn't be a bad night to give some of their regulars a rest, especially since it is the back half of a back to back. Gallant has begun to give a little more responsibility to Kakko and Lareniere as their line started all three periods last night and he should continue to given them more opportunities to build up their confidence for playoffs.
It'll be interesting to see if Gallant opts to use tonight as a rest day or if given last night's loss he'd rather put his best group out there to get back to winning. At the very least, he should look to give Barclay Goodrow a day off since he got a little banged up last night and aside from the teams COVID stint, hasn't missed much action. Assuming Chytil is good to go after being day-to-day, he can plug in for Goodrow and Gallant can run the same lineup as last night otherwise. If he does decide to rest guys, we could see something along the lines of:
Panarin - Strome - Kakko
Lafreniere - Copp - Vatrano
Brodzinski - Chytil - Gauthier
Hunt - Rooney - Reaves
Or if he wants to keep Kreider, who's chasing records in there he can get a little creative:
Kreider - Chytil - Kakko
Lafreniere - Strome - Vatrano
Brodzinski - Copp - Gauthier
Hunt - Rooney - Reaves
Regardless, it should be an interesting match up with both teams having played last night, one team being locked into the playoff picture and the other focusing on the future. I wouldn't expect much from this one but the hope should be that the Rangers get back on track and bounce back from last nights tough loss.
Chris Feldman
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