Regarding the Rangers, whose patience, discipline and structure will be challenged by the Senators in what shapes up as a far less physical series than the six-game tong war against Montreal. Just make sure to keep your head up around Alexandre Burrows and Dion Phaneuf:
1. Round One represented the playoff series of Ryan McDonagh’s life. The captain seemed to take that Game 3 defeat at the Garden personally — he was not alone — and subsequently elevated his play and brought his team along with him. McDonagh has never played more fiercely or defended with as much purpose as he did throughout these six games in which he was relentless in puck battles, mean in front, sharp with his decision-making in all three zones and re-established himself as one of the elite of the league’s elite defensemen. No. 27 was on for 10:30 in the third period of Saturday’s Game 6 clincher and for 5:25 of the final 8:32 until Derek Stepan’s empty-netter sealed the 3-1 victory.
2. You wouldn’t be wrong naming Sidney Crosby, Connor McDavid and Erik Karlsson as the three best players in the world. The Blueshirts’ coaching staff will be challenged to create a game plan to deal with the splendiferous Karlsson, the defenseman who does it all, and all at top speed across the entire 200×85.
Perhaps they should take the Fred Shero approach in the 1974 Cup finals against Bobby Orr, when the Flyers coach had his men repeatedly dump the puck into No. 4’s corner and hit him in order to wear him down.
If the outcome of the Henrik Lundqvist-Carey Price duel was determinative against Montreal, so too the battle between Lundqvist and Karlsson for Top Swede in this series is likely to be decisive.
3. We can take it for granted that Big Game Brass, who shows up wearing No. 19 for the other guys this time, will shine under the Broadway spotlight, because that is the essence of Derick Brassard, who had an assist on Clarke MacArthur’s overtime series winner in Boston and recorded eight points (2-6) against the B’s.
It is going to be on Mika Zibanejad, who improved steadily against Montreal and is a key part of the revived penalty-kill unit, to come as close as he can to negating Brassard in this delicious storyline.
4. The obvious cannot be stated more clearly than this: The Rangers need much, much more from Chris Kreider and J.T. Miller in order to keep this train on course to its destination.
Kreider’s high stick on Shea Weber behind the Montreal net at 9:07 of Saturday’s third period after No. 20 had allowed the defenseman to play the puck first was simply indefensible. You’d think Kreider would have learned from Miller’s equally mindless open-ice slashing penalty against Gallagher at 14:13 of the third period of the then-2-2 Game 5, or from No. 10’s own high-sticking infraction behind the Canadiens’ net at 16:23 of the second on Saturday, but apparently not.Miller did make a play to Kevin Hayes on the sequence off which No. 13 set up Mats Zuccarello for the series clincher, but his series was replete with too many high-risk plays that yielded little reward.
5. Zuccarello, meanwhile, is a Ranger essentially because of one person. That would be current president Glen Sather, who, as general manager, insisted on re-signing and bringing No. 36 back from Russia late in 2012-13 after the winger had played the entire lockout season for KHL Magnitogorsk as a restricted free agent. That followed two years in the New York organization during which he played 52 games for the Blueshirts and 73 games in the AHL.
6. Alain Vigneault started the playoffs by dressing Tanner Glass, who merely scored the opening (and winning) goal in the Blueshirts’ 2-0 Game 1 victory. And despite No. 15’s effectiveness on a hard forechecking fourth line with Oscar Lindberg and Jesper Fast, Vigneault replaced him with Pavel Buchnevich following Game 3, whereupon the Russian rookie contributed pace and playmaking ability the rest of the way. (Plus a couple of pretty nifty plays at his defensive line where he cleared the zone late in Game 6 with his team up by a goal.)
After sitting Nick Holden for the first time all year — after he cratered in Game 2 — Vigneault reinstated the defenseman for the remainder of the series, through which No. 22 played his best hockey since December.
When Brady Skjei turned in an impressive performance in Thursday’s Game 5 overtime victory in Montreal, Vigneault rode him with four shifts over the final 10 minutes of regulation and six in OT. But on Saturday, when the rookie was fighting it, Skjei rode the bench for the final 10:53.
Checkmark to the coach.