SUNRISE, Fla. — The end of regulation couldn’t get there fast enough for the New York Rangers on Sunday.
Under siege, it was almost like they were content to ice their way to overtime, sending the puck the length of the ice, 200 feet, five times in the last two minutes.
The Florida Panthers’ pressure was that relentless. Not only did they rally from two goals down to tie the score at 4-4 in a span of 1:54 to detonate their home arena, but also they out-attempted the Rangers 40-10 in the third period — 29-9 at five-on-five. The even-strength scoring chances were 14-3, the high-danger chances were 7-1. They kept making fast, aggressive plays below the hashmarks over and over and over, and Igor Shesterkin had to be a one-man show during those final hold-on-for-dear life five minutes, including a game-saver on Matthew Tkachuk with 39 seconds left.
But then the buzzer sounded, and the Rangers could breathe.
And the Panthers had to feel sick to their stomachs.
The Panthers couldn’t put the Rangers away, and now, as Peter Laviolette said a half-hour after Alex Wennberg delivered New York its fourth overtime win of the playoffs by a 5-4 score, that 17-minute third intermission gave the Rangers a chance to reset.
“We needed to go back to work,” the Rangers coach said. “We needed to go back on the attack, back on the forecheck. We were taking on a lot of heat in the third period, and I don’t necessarily think one period leads to the next period. Our second period didn’t lead to the third. Their first period didn’t lead to the second.”
The Panthers said all the right things after this one, that they didn’t feel a sag in the dressing room after letting the Rangers off the hook, that they were still pumped up and full of adrenaline and feeling excited about the prospect of coming out in overtime and finishing what they couldn’t complete in about as one-sided a third period as you’ll ever see.
But psychologically, there had to be an ominous feeling that they let that golden opportunity slip through their fingertips, and now we’re leaving this outcome to chance.
After all, despite going at one point 10-plus minutes without a shot between the third period and overtime, the Rangers would now just need one shot to take a 2-1 series lead … exactly like that harmless-looking final one by Ryan Lindgren that somehow sifted toward the net and was tipped by Wennberg, a player who had one goal in 19 regular-season games for the Rangers and zero in 12 playoff games.
But that goal in the biggest moment for Wennberg handed Florida its second consecutive overtime defeat after it had won 11 in a row. It also gave the Panthers their first losing streak of these playoffs.
ALEX WENNBERG GAME WINNER!!!
NEW YORK HAS TAKEN A 2-1 SERIES LEAD #StanleyCup pic.twitter.com/rJ6tCxjwjY
— NHL (@NHL) May 26, 2024
“It seems like we’re always a team that’s able to calm down and regroup,” Lindgren said. “You almost feel like you’re starting fresh when you get into the locker room and take a little breather. We know we could play better, and we did.”
Added Wennberg, “This team, we have that belief. Maybe we’re not the most vocal, but we all look at each other, we know what to do and you see when we get out there, we get the job done.”
This was one wildly entertaining game that started with Sam Reinhart’s power-play goal and a tremendous response by the Rangers as Alexis Lafrenière scored the first of his two highlight-reel goals followed 25 seconds later by Barclay Goodrow’s redirection for a 2-1 Rangers lead.
But then Reinhart, who had a league-leading 27 power-play goals in the regular season, scored his second of the game to tie it.
Lafrenière scored again, then the Panthers got a tremendous gift when Rangers captain Jacob Trouba took a slashing penalty followed by an elbowing penalty on Evan Rodrigues on the same shift. First, there was somehow no call on the elbowing that left Rodrigues dazed and caused him to leave the game for the rest of the period. Then referees Kelly Sutherland and Eric Furlatt conferred and decided to call a major so they could review it only to downgrade the second Trouba penalty to a minor presumably because they felt the elbow hit Rodrigues in the shoulder before making contact with his head.
Slo-mo of Jacob Trouba’s elbow on Evan Rodrigues 😬 pic.twitter.com/2OZVW3FQf4
— Brady Trettenero (@BradyTrett) May 26, 2024
Coach Paul Maurice couldn’t believe it, but afterward said, “I think I got enough on my plate. I’m not gonna do any refereeing or player safety tonight. I’ll just stick with the coaching.”
Still, it was a tremendous chance for the Panthers, trailing 3-2, to tie the score or even take the lead on the double minor. Instead, they promptly gave up the Rangers’ fifth short-handed goal of the playoffs to two-time Stanley Cup champion Goodrow, the Game 2 overtime hero who now has six goals in 13 games this postseason after scoring four times in 80 regular-season games.
“You don’t want to give up those,” captain Aleksander Barkov said. “We know they’re always going on the penalty kill, so we got to be ready for that.”
GOODROW SHORTHANDED. 4-2. pic.twitter.com/vpLuxXKy7A
— B/R Open Ice (@BR_OpenIce) May 26, 2024
Still, a few minutes into the third period, Maurice ran his lines through the blender and the payoff was immediate with goals by Barkov and Gustav Forsling to turn a 4-2 deficit into a 4-4 tie.
Maurice had used the same lineup and same lines since the second period of Game 6 of the Boston Bruins series. But finally, he took super quiet Vladimir Tarasenko and demoted him to the third line and got him away from Barkov and Reinhart by elevating second-line left wing Carter Verhaeghe.
Sam Bennett and Rodrigues were elevated from the third line to the second with Tkachuk, and Anton Lundell centered Eetu Luostarinen and Tarasenko.
FORSLING. TIE GAME. 😱 pic.twitter.com/etqqbdfrQt
— B/R Open Ice (@BR_OpenIce) May 26, 2024
Maurice explained that he recognized the guys who were going. Verhaeghe, through three periods, had been on the ice for 53 Panthers shot attempts versus only eight Rangers attempts against at five-on-five, according to Natural Stat Trick. Tkachuk was on for a ridiculous 53-4.
Still, Maurice wasn’t taking any solace in the shot attempts being 108-44 in favor of the Panthers when the final score read 5-4, Rangers.
“I don’t know how many pucks we put to the net, but Lord knows we left most of our offense off shin pads or wide of the post,” Maurice said.
He’s not wrong. The Rangers, led by Trouba’s nine, blocked 37 shots. The Panthers fired 38 shots on net but missed the net 28 times and had another 42 shots blocked.
This was a gut punch for the Panthers.
To score two power-play goals yet feel like the Rangers’ penalty kill won them the game by killing off that double minor, giving up a short-handed goal and then being unable to score on a late third-period power play after Trouba took his third minor. To dominate a third period like that and not end up with the victory. To give up five goals on home ice, and none of them to Mika Zibanejad, Artemi Panarin, Chris Kreider or Vincent Trocheck.
The Panthers have to find a way heading into Tuesday night’s Game 4 at home to mentally and physically recover.
That won’t be easy.
That’s why Maurice said he doesn’t want his players to forget about Sunday’s disappointment. Instead, he wants them to be ticked off by the feeling they allowed the Rangers to escape Sunrise with one heck of a theft.
But that’s what happens when you leave things to chance in a sport in which one shot can make or break you.
“Sometimes you want to keep the growl,” Maurice said. “A lot of times in the playoffs it’s about making sure that you keep that energy full, that you cut off your losses, that you let it go. Then there’s times you want to keep it and eat it and let it burn for a while and find a different energy source.
“So when you put up whatever we put up tonight and you don’t come away with a win, you should be a little growly.”
(Photo: Peter Joneleit / Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)