Anyone looking for some "edge" to this game got it right off the opening faceoff when Brandon Prust and Travis Moen dropped the gloves. Prust continues to be the ultimate warrior for the Rangers and never turns down a willing opponent.
The Rangers kept up the energy with Artem Anisimov giving them the early lead 5:28 into the game. The goal was started by Anisimov making an excellent defensive play blocking Yanick Weber's shot inside his defensive blueline and then took off the other way on a breakaway. Anisimov skated in on Price and made multiple deke's before beating Price with the backhand shot. The goal was his 17th of the season and fourth in the last eight game.
The Canadiens answered back quickly when P.K. Subban unleashed a howitzer of a slap shot from the high slot that when through tons of traffic. Lundqvist had no chance to stop that one as it was just simply too good a shot and he could not have seen it. The roar from the visiting Canadiens was as loud as any I ever heard on a visiting goal at Madison Square Garden.
The chippiness continued as Prust and Subban received coincidental minors off a scrum in front. The next shift down the ice it would be Roman Hamrlik going off for two minutes for crosschecking Marc Staal giving the Rangers a four-on-three advantage. The Rangers would not score on the advantage but the pressure they had would be rewarded just 9 seconds after it ended. Dan Girardi would pick up the rebound from Erik Christensen’s shot and fired from the top of the circle at 10:25 to give the Rangers the lead again. The goal was Girardi’s fourth and first since December 16.
New York poured it on late in the first with three goals in 1:07. Ryan Callahan banged home the first one on a scramble in front. The shot sent up the back and off the head of James Wisniewski in which the puck hopped over Carey Price and in. Marian Gaborik added his fourth in four games when he collected the loose puck in the slot and fired it home. Brian Boyle would finish the onslaught and send Carey Price packing at 18:16 with his 21st of the season. The play was created by a beautiful rush from Marc Staal who then fed the puck across to Boyle and he didn’t miss making it 5-1 in a tremendous period for New York.
The Canadiens struck early in the second on a goal from James Wisniewski. The blast can't from the right point at 4:13 of the period.
Late in the second P.K. Subban pulled another one if his BS moves that is going to get him wrecked one of these days. Subban deliberately ran Henrik Lundqvist and when Michael Sauer challenged him to fight over it he backed away like a coward and waited until the refs were in the way to drop his gloves and pretend he would have fought.
Ryan Callahan took a bad penalty late in the period and it carried over into the third with the Rangers up 5-2.
The Callahan penalty ended up biting the Rangers as Brian Gionta deflected a Wisniewski slap shot in just 54 seconds into the third.
Late in the third Benoit Pouliot would crash into Henrik Lundqvist and Hank would remain down for several minutes as he was worked on by Jim Ramsay. Lundqvist would stay in the game and watch as Vinny Prospal capped the scoring as the Rangers finally beat the Canadiens this year by a final of 6-3.
Published with Blogger-droid v1.6.7
