PITTSBURGH — Well, of all the issues the Rangers will have to confront the rest of the way, at least they will not have to concern themselves with their self-described “lack of killer instinct” against teams below them in the standings.
That’s because beginning with this afternoon’s match here against the Penguins, six of their seven remaining contests are against clubs the Blueshirts trail in the standings. The seventh is against the Canadiens, a team the Blueshirts will fall behind if they lose in regulation and Montreal beats Buffalo tonight.
A Rangers victory today would give the Blueshirts the season-series tiebreak advantage against the Penguins should the clubs finish with identical records. The Rangers and Penguins each have six points thus far in the series with the Blueshirts 3-2 against Pittsburgh’s 2-1-2. The Rangers trail the Penguins by one point in the overall standings.
Coach John Tortorella responded to all questions following yesterday’s 50-minute practice session, though he would not reveal why he did not use Nikolai Zherdev in the six-round shootout in Atlanta on Thursday during which the Rangers were blanked.
Tortorella said that would remain between himself and the sniper. That is certainly his prerogative, but it sure seems like a bizarre time to be sending a message (if that was indeed the motivation), and even more so because he awarded Zherdev three shifts in overtime of the eventual 5-4 defeat.
Tortorella and assistant coach Jim Schoenfeld have been matching the young defense pair of Marc Staal and Dan Girardi against the opposition’s top line as much as possible. Thursday, the pair went minus-four in attempting to deal with the dazzling Ilya Kovalchuk.
True enough, the defense received precious little support from the forwards, but it will be interesting to monitor whether the kids have suffered any carryover psychological damage when they get on this afternoon against Sidney Crosby and his recently acquired wingmen Billy Guerin and Chris Kunitz. Dealing with the Evgeni Malkin-Petr Sykora-Tyler Kennedy unit will be no picnic either.
Indeed, the Penguins’ offensive prowess should provide an interesting window through which to view Tortorella’s twin mantras of, “Our defense is offense,” and, “It’s not about defense in our end zone.”
The problem arises, however, when the Rangers decide to interpret the latter piece of philosophy literally, as they did on Thursday.
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Defenseman Wade Redden, regressing dramatically, did not get on the ice for so much as a second of power-play time in the third period, though the Blueshirts worked with the man advantage for 3:15. Derek Morris was on the point for 2:21 in the third and Paul Mara was on for 2:13. Mara did not skate yesterday because his eye was swollen in the aftermath of taking a second-period high stick. He is expected to play today.
Fred Sjostrom skated with Chris Drury and Nik Antropov at practice as Markus Naslund moved to the left with Brandon Dubinsky and Zherdev. Naslund, who has had reasonably good chemistry with Zherdev at different times throughout the year, got just 12 minutes of ice in Atlanta, while Scott Gomez’s 26:37 represented a single-game high for any Blueshirts forward this season.