In the midst of the Rangers’ seven-game winning streak, coach John Tortorella stated, “We’re teetering on going the wrong way here.” And man was he right. The Rangers did more than teeter against San Jose – they plummeted, crashed and burned. Their poor play finally caught up with them. They can come out on the winning side against a team like Toronto while being outplayed, but not against an upper-echelon team like the Sharks. As the third period went on, I thought I was reliving the Giants-Saints game. How did Drew Brees end up with a hat trick?
The Rangers are taking way too many penalties. In the first nine games of the year, they’ve been shorthanded a whopping 49 times, which is third worst in the league. The good news is that their penalty killing is again one of the best in the league. But it’s hard to control the game and score goals when player after player is marching off to the penalty box. …
Now that the Great Balloon Hoax of Aught-Nine is over, we can concentrate on sports again (CC Sabathia’s uniform is so big and baggy, it could probably be filled with helium and flown across the country, too). This past week in New York sports, the Yankees swept the Twins and now have to take on those pesky, team-of-destiny Angels, the Giants killed the Raiders to stay undefeated, the Jets suffered their second consecutive loss, the Rangers kept on winning, the Devils heated up, but the poor Islanders still couldn’t manage to notch their first victory of the year. The most bizarre moment of the week, though, was the Mickey Rourke sighting on the Giants sideline. And Kevin Bacon showed up at the Garden for the Knicks preseason home opener. Is the cast of Diner making the rounds of the local sports teams to commemorate the 27th anniversary of the movie?
Besides being at the Knicks game, Bacon could also be seen hiding in the Yankees dugout on Friday because, unbeknownst to A. J. Burnett, that was Shrevie’s wife, donned in curly …
The season is still very early, but it looks like the Rangers have found themselves a legitimate first line. Marian Gaborik, Brandon Dubinsky and Vinny Prospal fit together like other great trios of the past – the Marx Brothers, the Three Stooges, the Mod Squad, Richie, Ralph and Potsie, Cream and, of course, Charlie’s Angels (well, maybe not them – or any of the others come to think of it).
Gaborik is the first top-talent game-changer the Rangers have had since the days of Jaromir Jagr (seems like a long time ago now, doesn’t it?). But Jagr was finicky and quirky, and had trouble fitting with other linemates (except Michael Nylander). Gaborik, Dubinsky and Prospal have clicked since game one. And they’re producing on a nightly basis. Gaborik is all he was cracked up to be (I’m crossing my fingers that he doesn’t get injured as I write this), netting five goals to go along with four assists in six games. He has a point in every game, …
The Giants kept on rolling this week, the Jets lost to a good Saints team (but traded for troublemaker Braylon Edwards), hockey season has started, with mixed results for the three local teams, the Mets held a day-long press conference on Monday to announce the firing of two coaches, and the $200-million juggernaut that is the Yankees steamrolled over the Twins in the opening game of their playoff series. Here are some fun facts about the Yanks and Twins:
CC Sabathia eats more food in one year than the farmers of Minnesota produce combined.
Brett Favre was warming up in the Twins bullpen in the seventh inning of Wednesday’s game.
George Steinbrenner gave an inspired speech to the team down in Tampa after the Yankees’ final regular season game. It was short, yet fiery: “Where the hell is my damn calzone!”
After defeating the Tigers in their dramatic one-game showdown on Tuesday, the Twins immediately called Darryl Strawberry, Lenny Dykstra and Keith Hernandez to find out the most effective way to destroy a plane on a flight to New …
It’s only three games into the season, but we’re already seeing differences between last year’s Rangers team and this season’s version. A (relatively) new coach and an overhauled roster will do that. Here are seven contrasts between the Tom Renney 2008-09 Blushirts and John Tortorella’s 2009-10 edition.
1. Only one minute and 24 seconds into Monday’s game against the Devils, Tortorella called a timeout and ripped his team a new one. And the players actually responded, by going out, working hard and winning the game. Renney would have politely implored his players to at least act like they were trying, and then been just as politely ignored, resulting in a 6-1 shellacking.
2. The safe, boring, sit-back-and-wait-for-bad-things-to-happen style of Renney is gone. And when the aggressive, all-hands-on-deck attacking mode that Tortorella favors isn’t working that night, the team is showing it can adapt, like they did in New Jersey, settling into a blue-collar battling approach.
3. The defensemen are scoring. Last year the D couldn’t score …
Glen Sather magically and miraculously got rid of Scott Gomez this summer and signed Marian Gaborik. But, much like going into last season, this year’s Rangers are ruled by “ifs” and question marks. Sather overhauled the team yet again – does he ever have a plan? (“This isn’t plans one through eight in outer space, this is plan nine! This is the one that worked!”) Maybe this is the team John Tortorella wants, though, with his faster, attacking style of play. Last season Sather tried to replace the offense of Jaromir Jagr, Brendan Shanahan and Martin Straka with Nikolai Zherdev, Markus Naslund and other assorted characters, and it didn’t quite work out. The 2009-10 Rangers are thin on defense and have a number of unproven forwards – the only constant is the goaltending, with Henrik Lundqvist and Steve Valiquette back again.
Gone But Not Forgotten: Gomez, Zherdev, Naslund, Lauri Korpikoski, Nik Antropov, Fredrik Sjostrom, Blair Betts, Colton Orr, Paul Mara, Derek Morris and Erik Reitz.
This …
Ranger great Brian Leetch was elected to the Hockey Hall of Fame today (along with other first-time-eligible players Steve Yzerman, Brett Hull and Luc Robitaille). And it couldn’t have happened to a nicer, classier guy. Leetch played parts of 17 seasons for the Blueshirts, serving as captain from 1997-2000, and finished his career with Toronto and Boston (we don’t need to get into that now). He was one of the best American-born hockey players ever to play the game, and was also one of the greatest defensemen ever to lace up the skates in the NHL.
His list of awards and accomplishments is long: Of course he’s a Stanley Cup winner, Conn Smythe Trophy winner (first and still only American to win that award), two-time Norris Trophy winner (‘92 & ‘97), Calder Trophy winner (‘89), two-time First Team NHL All-Star (‘92 & ‘97), three-time Second Team NHL All-Star and he played in nine All-Star games. He is one of only five defensemen in NHL history to record over 100 points …
This wasn’t your everyday seven-game series. We saw biting, suspensions, water-bottle-throwing, unruly fans, cheap shots left and right (by both teams), close games and blowouts – well, maybe that is a typical seven-game series in the NHL. But when it was over, the better team won. The question isn’t: How did the Rangers blow a 3-1 lead, but: How did the Capitals not sweep? Washington has so much more talent than the Rangers that the series shouldn’t have been this close. But at the same time, what happened to the Rangers in games five and six? No Sean Avery in game five, no John Tortorella in game six, no big effort and no defense in either. If the Blueshirts would have played like they did in game seven in those games, they probably would have come out with a series win.
The Rangers’ fast start to the season raised expectations for them, and the same thing happened in this series. They surprised everyone by leading the Eastern Conference the …
This week’s games came in a variety pack. New York saw a 22-4 game along with two 1-0 ones all on the same day, a walk-off infield single, a walk-off 14th-inning home run, a loss with 00.2 seconds left on the clock and two goaltending performances for the ages. The Yankees recovered from their embarrassing loss and ended up 4-1 since last Friday. The Rangers took a surprising 3-1 lead in their series, the Devils are up 3-2 and the Mets are teetering on the edge of despair.
Winner
Henrik Lundqvist: All hail the King. “He’s awesome. We love him. He’s the king,” gushed Paul Mara (who apparently stole Joaquin Phoenix’s beard). Lundqvist shut out Washington on Saturday, and after letting in four goals on Monday because his defensemen accidentally showed up at the old Madison Square Garden, played the game of his life in Wednesday’s victory. He made a playoff career-high 38 saves while standing on his head, his toes, his elbows and anything else he could stand on to save the Rangers. He’s …
I’m not sure what’s going on here. I’m a little confused. Are these the same New York Rangers I’ve watched all year? Is that really Wade Redden, the poster boy for nightmarish free agent contracts, and Michal Rozsival looking like a top-notch #1 defensive pair, stopping the high-powered Capitals offense? Is that really Markus Naslund playing with passion and purpose (though committing too many penalties)? Is that the whole team clogging the shooting lanes, blocking shots and playing sound defense? Was that the same feeble power play from the regular season scoring twice in the first game? Is that Scott Gomez stepping up and playing like the playoff veteran he is? Is that Alex Ovechkin being shutout in the first two games? I guess my eyes don’t deceive me.
What’s not surprising is the play of Henrik Lundqvist. He’s been the best player in the series so far, and if the Rangers are going to win he’s going to have to keep it up. He’s the Rangers’ big advantage. The …
The Rangers made the playoffs. Barely. That’s four years in a row, though. After 81 games, the one thing we’ve learned about them is that they’re inconsistent. With the season on the line, they can play like they did in Boston or like they did vs. Montreal and Philadelphia. It’s anyone’s guess which team shows up for the post-season. The only consistency they’ve had all season is on their special teams play – consistently good on the penalty kill and consistently bad on the power play. With the regular season just about wrapped up, here are some awards for the year:
The Nick Fotiu Award (for overachieving): Ryan Callahan
The Bill Fairburn Award (for knowing his role and doing his job better than anybody else): Blair Betts
The Esa Tikkanen Award (for annoying the crap out of the opposition): Sean Avery
The Marcel Dionne Award (for winding up a hall-of-fame career with the Rangers and having a decent, nothing-special season): Markus Naslund
The Marek Malik Award (for being the worst defenseman on the …
The Knicks and Nets are officially dead so baseball season has arrived just in time. The Mets’ and Yankees’ starting rotations got off to rocky starts, but there are 159 games left. No need to panic, right? Right? On the ice, the Devils and Rangers have both clinched playoff spots. They’re the only two Eastern Conference teams to qualify for the post-season in each of the last four seasons. It looks like they won’t be facing each other in the first round, though, so we won’t have Martin Brodeur/Sean Avery redux. At least not yet. The prize for this week’s Hot Stove Player of the Week is a trip to the playoffs.
Winner
Henrik Lundqvist: The Rangers’ goalie only allowed one goal in each of his team’s games this week. He made one mistake in Boston, which was one too many, but led the team to two crucial wins after that. And he stopped 37 shots last night against the Flyers and saved the game with a handful of outstanding …
