Despite a short-lived second period comeback, the Rangers even up their record on the road, dropping their second game of the trip to the Minnesota Wild. Before we get into everything that went wrong with this one, you have to credit Gerard Gallant for starting all his Minnesota born players in what was either their first time playing at the Xcel Energy Center in the NHL, or their first time since before COVID. K’Andre Miller, Johnny Brodzinski and Ryan Lindgren among those players, all with lots of family and friends in the house. Unfortunately, it wouldn’t be the best showing for this Rangers team, who quickly let the game get out of hand on more than one occasion.
The Wild would strike first when Kirill Kaprizov passed it up to Ryan Hartman, who let a clean shot go off the blocker of Georgiev, in the back of the net to make it 1-0 about midway through the start of the game. Alexandar Georgiev got the start to give Igor Shesterkin, who the Rangers need to keep fresh, a night off. This was a goal that Georgiev likely immediately wished he could have back but nevertheless, the Rangers were down. Wouldn’t be long after that until Joel Eriksson Ek tipped in a high shot by Marcus Foligno to make it 2-0, setting the tone for how the rest of this game would go.
Alexandar Georgiev undoubtedly was the topic of discussion pretty much before, during and after this game. Every night that he gets the start for the Rangers, it seems we're having the same discussions and questioning his capabilities. I’ve been a big Georgiev defender from the jump but the fact of the matter is, he needs a change of scenery and the Rangers made the wrong call back when they were high on him. Hindsight is twenty twenty but the Rangers never should have bought out Lundqvist as he would’ve spent that year on LTIR and they could still have Keith Kinkaid back up. Georgiev’s value was at its highest when they decided to buy Hank out and that’s when they should’ve traded him.
I’m all for asset management and looking to not settle for less when it comes to getting value for your guys, but the Rangers are doing more harm than good at this point. If the Rangers can trade Georgiev one for one for a guy like Artturi Lehkonen or can get a third or a couple late picks for him, you have to pull the trigger. Unless you want to give Igor a full week off and ride Georgiev to get him in a rhythm that will hopefully showcase him at his best, it’s just not going to work with him as a backup goalie. They’re wasting his time, they’re losing games and quite frankly shattering his confidence in the process.
Shots were even through one at six a piece and the Rangers would carry that theme through the second, only registering seven to Minnesota’s eleven. They would however get on the board and that started with a beautiful pass from Ryan Strome to Dryden Hunt who snapped it in for his fourth goal of the season, his first in thirty games. Not necessarily a great stat for a guy who’s primarily played second line minutes but at the end of the day, Dryden Hunt isn’t a second line player. He hasn’t been bad on that second line, it’s just not where he belongs, especially if this team is looking to make a deep playoff run. Good for him for breaking the slump but unless he starts doing that a whole lot more, the Rangers have to improve at that position.
The only penalty of the game would come about seven and a half minutes in when Patrik Nemeth tripped up Minnesota forward Nick Bjudstad. Mika Zibanejad would tie the game up shorthanded not long after the call, stripping his former linemate, Mats Zuccarello of the puck to come in for a partial breakaway, Pulling his signature backhand move, he beat Cam Talbot and for a split second, we had a tied hockey game. Still on the power play, the Wild would quickly take control back in the game and regained the lead off a Kevin Fiala power play goal. With about seven minutes left, Marcus Foligno gave the Wild insurance and Kevin Fiala made it five with his second of the night.
This is likely a burn the tape kind of night as the Rangers will head from Minnesota straight to St. Louis for another tough match up with the Blues. You can’t pin this loss all on Georgiev as he had solid spurts and the team left him out to dry defensively. While the final shot tally resulted with the Rangers up 28-25, six and seven shots in the first two periods is not a strong enough start to a hockey game. Slow starts and generating offense at five on five continues to be an issue in conversation until the trade deadline hopefully brings in some new faces but there’s no question the team needs to be better in their next showing in St. Louis on Thursday.
Chris Feldman
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