'He was banking 'em in out of the air, scoring on breakaways, skating through everybody with it, making highlight-film goals.' Guess what, folks - I 'aint talking about Jaromir Jagr either.Minnesota Wild's Marian Gaborik showed The New York Rangers how to play hockey last night scoring five of the six Minnesota goals, plus an assist scoring a total of six points against our Blueshirts. Sergei Fedorov did it for Detroit on Dec. 26, 1996, in an overtime game against Washington. Pittsburgh's Mario Lemieux was the last to net five in regulation, on March 26, 1996, versus St. Louis.
Official recap here.
A big loss for the Rangers as this was the first game of their West Coast roadtrip, one that many believe will determine Coach Tom Renney's fate. Post game, Renney again defended the Blueshirts in the game they played and was quoted as saying he "wouldn't have done anything differently" about last night's game against the subtley slaughtering Wild. He "felt cheated by the officials after unsportsmanlike conduct penalties...which led to goals from Gaborik and Pierre-Marc Bouchard."
Okay. This is 'poo-poo' talk. The outrageousness Gaborik scoring binge was determined by simple mistakes in our team system - sometimes referred to as 'bad defense' - though our NYR defending coach would never suggest any weakness in his team. Jagr should receive some type of anti-award for not being able to clear the puck one-on-one in our own zone, which led to a goal, the runner-up to this award should be Chris Drury. Four of the first five goals were avoidable if New York simply played a tighter game. Lundqvist was awful. Gomez was fast as always - I do like him on the first line - and the improved power play squad may be finding some 'juice' as well.
Though a strange game and loss, I have to declare three-cheers for the following players: Petr Prucha (God bless the little-man who takes hits like a champ), Dan Girardi (a rising star) and Marc Staal (like his brothers, but a better asset). I'll actually say it here, I am beginning to enjoy the speed of Scott Gomez and think he will rise out of this coaching and captain mess - like everyone declared, he will find himself in this team.
So on to another tough Western contender, the Colorado Avalanche - tonight at 9pm EST on the MSGnetwork - comments to follow. Let's go Rangers!!!
tdr
