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By Zach Schiff  January 13, 2010, at 12:28 am  Can’t be any disappointed hockey fans out in the NY-NJ area tonight, from the 17,000 Ranger fans at MSG, to the 1,000 Devil fans at MSG, to the 4,000 Islander fans who routinely sell out the lower bowl on the Nassau Coliseum, to the 17,000 fans that the New Jersey Devils have accumulated since Aaron Broten first led them on the ice in 1982.
Yes, Bryan, the Rangers-Devils game was excellent, except for one thing – it underscored how bad the Rangers are at mustering offense. Henrik Lundqvist was great in stopping 45 shots – downright incredible on a few.
And I won’t bash Marty Brodeur as I normally would. Any time you stop 51 shots, you played great. Of course, the Rangers made it very easy for about 40 of those shots. He did make a few excellent saves, and while he didn’t do much on Marian Gaborik’s overtime-near-score, that save on Michal Rozsival with time running out in the extra period was good.
Shots from the boards, shots with no traffic in front, shots to Brodeur’s glove. C’mon! Do you really think a wrister from the left circle is going past Brodeur’s glove? You can tell me all you want about how many shots they had, and I will tell you until I’m blue in the face that it doesn’t matter if they’re 90% crappy shots.
And I guess that old hockey adage “If you shoot enough, one is bound to go in” was proven wrong tonight.
Remember March of 2007 when Rick DiPietro made, what, 56 saves in a shootout loss to the Rangers? The Rangers made him look like Jesus Christ that night – albeit he was clean-shaven, and Christ would wear #33 not #39. But they had so many awful, easy-to-save shots that it looked like nothing would get by him, and rarely anything did except for a goal in regulation and a Matt Cullen goal in the shootout.
Anyway, fast-paced, end-to-end action with good defense play that wasn’t boring. It was a very good game to watch and would’ve been sweeter with a Rangers’ win, but now the Rangers web site can say they are 9-1-3 in the last 13 games.
And I can’t even get mad at the shootout result. It would’ve been nce to have had a Ranger score, but they couldn’t, and Patrick Elias’ wrister that beat Lundqvist was awesome.
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Telling stat of the night brought to us by Versus and Jack Daniels Old No. 7: Marian Gaborik was 2-for-17 in shootouts going into tonight. Now, he is 2-for-18, around 11%. By comparison, Erik Christensen, Zach Parise, and Ales Kotalik are near (or over) 50%.
Why does John Tortorella keep putting Gaborik in? I know he’s a superstar, I know he’d the “stud” on the team, and I know he scored in the shootout in Atlanta, but he isn’t a breakaway artist.
Jaromir Jagr wasn’t. Gaborik isn’t either. Stick to Kotalik, Christensen, Vinny Prospal, Artem Anisimov, and maybe even Ryan Callahan. But keep Gaborik out of it until at least the 6th round.
Enver Lisin would’ve been nice to have seen pull some moves out of his bag. But alas, Donald Brashear needed to have his customary 8 shifts and 5:53 of ice time.
Hey, didn’t Lisin score in Atlanta?
By Zach Schiff January 2, 2010, at 9:53 am The US Olympic team should re-name themselves Team Ryan: Ryan Suter, Ryan Miller, Ryan Callahan, Ryan Kessler, Ryan Malone, and Bobby Ryan.
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Why the big deal over Doug Weight, Bill Guerin, and Keith Tkachuk not making the 2010 US Olympic team? The US wants to win, right?
Weight had no goals in 11 games before being injured… again. His first game back was the night before the Olympic selections were announced. Guerin is actually scoring around the same pace he was in 2002 when the team won the Silver Medal, but he’s 39 and the chances that he’ll have anything left for 8 games in 11 days is very slim. Tkachuk hasn’t been a force on any team since before the lockout, and he would just be taking space for a young power forward – say, Ryan Callahan (or Ryan Malone).
Scott Gomez was an interesting name left off. He just turned 30 last week and he played well in the 2006 Olympics in Italy, but those of us who watched him the past 2 years (and anyone following him in Montreal this year) know that he just isn’t as good in another system as he was with the Devils.
I would also venture to guess that it came down to Gomez and Chris Drury fighting for a spot, and with John Tortorella as an assistant coach, Drury got the nod.
I like Callahan and Drury being on the team. I’m very excited for Callahan and I think the experience can only help him. As for Drury, he won’t play 20 minutes a night for them so he won’t come back burnt out. Plus, being there could inspire him to play better – he said so himself after being selected to the team.
As for Henrik Lundqvist and Marian Gaborik? Awful.
Remember how good the Rangers were playing in 2005-06 before the Olympic break? They were 20 games over .500, then ended the season 9-11-4 after the break. Lundqvist came back grinding his teeth and with migraines and was utterly awful in the playoffs against New Jersey (he’ll admit it). Jaromir Jagr came back hurt from a Jarrko Ruutu check; on top of that, a nagging hip injury was made worse by the lack of off-days in the compressed Olympic schedule.
Without Jagr and Lundqvist, that team was just a bunch of role players who played great together and had a dream season.
Without Gaborik and Lundqvist, this team is a bunch of young players who haven’t really meshed yet (and a few overpriced veterans who are just waiting for their careers to end).
What happens if Lundqvist gets hurt? The season is officially over. What if Gaborik gets hurt? So far, he hasn’t injured anything that was hurt in previous seasons, but you shouldn’t press the matter. An injury to him in Vancouver could have negative effects on him – and this team – for the next 4 years.
Plus, Hank could use the rest for 3 weeks before the stretch-drive.
Four reasons I am very against NHL players playing in the Olympics…
1) It should be an amateur competition.
2) You’re stopping an exciting NHL season for 3 weeks and expecting people to pick off where it left off 21 days later.
3) The chance for injury is too great. (Ask the Ottawa Senators how the rest of their season was when Dominik Hasek was injured in the Czech Republic’s first game in ‘06.)
4) It can be a career-maker for a young kid. Paul Kariya and Peter Forsberg in the 1992 Olympics in the shootout was an instant classic. I’d much rather have that than see Chris Pronger snuff out Evgeni Malkin in the bronze medal game because they’re division rivals.
By Zach Schiff November 4, 2009, at 12:21 pm The last two times that the Edmonton Oilers faced the Rangers, the Rangers lost in a shootout. Last time, they fired 42 shots on net and scored on only 2 – on a backup goaltender. Ah, the Tom Renney era…
Well, tomorrow, the Rangers meet Tom Renney again, and while not many current players were there for a lot of his reign (Henrik Lundqvist and Michal Rozsival were the only ones there from his first full season in 2005-06), it should be an emotional night for him. Imagine if the game were at Madison Square Garden?
 While I rip on Renney a lot here, I do think he was a very good coach, and I’m sure he will be sometime soon. There are a few coaches who will “always be a Ranger,” no matter where they wind up coaching or working. Mike Keenan, though he only had 1 season, is one of them. Renney is another.
No coach could have done what he did after the lockout. He took a team destined to fail -at least according to the experts – and brought them into the playoffs, one point away from winning the division. He got 123 points out of Jaromir Jagr – a man who would have refused to return to the NHL if he wasn’t playing for Renney in New York, he once said. He turned a team of veterans – Rucchin, Jagr, Straka, Rucinsky, Kasparaitis, Nylander – and young no-names – Jay Ward, Ortmeyer, Dom Moore, Hollweg, Orr, Prucha, Betts – into a contender.
I still say that if not for the Olympics, the Rangers could have gone far that year. Jagr and Lundqvist came back injured – Jagr with hip and groin problems, Hank with headaches from grinding his teeth. And then there was Sandis Ozolinsh, who seemed like a good trade at first until he came apart in the Devils’ series and cost the team 2 games.
Still, Renney was a huge part of the rebuilding process. While they rebuilt, he brought them into the playoffs. He just wasn’t a good fit for the team last year and going forward. His style had stopped working, and he continued to play people based on their paychecks rather than skill (see: Wade Redden on the power play while Petr Prucha sat in street clothes).
For all the good he did, he will be remembered for 2 things: being fired when the team couldn’t score and for Game 5 in Buffalo, where Fedor Tyutin and rookie Dan Girardi were on the ice with 30 seconds left with a 1-0 lead. When they iced the puck, Tyutin and Girardi had to stay on, they couldn’t clear the puck, and Chris Drury scored.
Besides that being the one game that still upsets my stomach (and the only time I ever lost sleep over a sports event), you know that if they won that game and went up 3-2 in the series, they would not have lost Game 6 at MSG. I’m not saying they would have won the Stanley Cup – hell, they might not even have beaten Ottawa in the Conference Finals – but they would have beaten Buffalo. And maybe Chris Drury never would’ve been signed the following summer, and maybe everything would’ve been different.
But this is how it’s played out, and I wish Tom Renney the best in Edmonton – no matter how often I make fun of his healthy scratches or his power play.
By Zach Schiff October 27, 2009, at 8:48 am It’s been a slow week here at The Rivalry, due to Bryan having a new baby to take care of (poor excuse) and me having work and a marathon 24 session the other night (better excuse).
I wanted to write something Saturday night after the Rangers overtime loss to Montreal about how, even though they lost, there was still some good to take from the game. Mainly, I wanted to write about the good surrounding the goals they scored.
For example…
Rangers fan favorite Michal Rozsival had a nice shot on Jaroslav Halak moments before Artem Anisimov scored to make it 1-1. It was good to see Rozy shooting – I guess he finally realized there’s no Jaromir Jagr to pass to and he decided he better shoot. And Anisimov? That goal was beautiful – patient and surgeon-like in accuracy.
While Ales Kotalik had a great shot on his goal that made it 2-1 and Sean Avery had a nice pass from behind the net (which he does quite often), the real credit lies with Dan Girardi. If not for him quickly catching the puck from midair and passing it behind the net from the point, the puck would’ve been cleared and play would’ve gone down to Henrik Lundqvist’s side of the ice.
On the 3-1 goal, all 3 players who got points had excellent plays. Marian Gaborik fought off a defender and passed to Vinny Prospal, who saw danger coming and softly hit the puck off the boards to Matt Gilroy, who had an absolute bomb from the point. He also was patient and followed it up with a booming shot. Very good to see that.
Gaborik made it 4-2 on nice passes from Mike Del Zotto and Enver Lisin. In two quick, long passes, they sprung him for a breakaway, and of course, he scored.
Sure, there were some defensive breakdowns. I guess Gaborik’s back-checking could be a little stronger. And yes, they blew two 2-goal leads before losing the game. And yes, they gave up a hat trick. And they even made Scott Gomez look good in the game. But they did have a few good plays that shone through – most notably Gaborik’s offensive skills and Girardi’s great play on the Kotalik goal.
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I want to talk about two things now, both related to last night’s win against Phoenix.
1) Chris Drury – He hasn’t been playing incredibly well, and he definitely hasn’t been lighting it up on the stats sheet, but I think that’s okay this year. Last season, the pressure was on him to score, and he came up with 56 points in 81 games, just under his career average of 59.53 points per game. (You could even say he had a lot of pressure to score in 2007-08 when Brendan Shanahan was hurt, Jagr was hurt and slower, and Rozsival and Marty Straka wouldn’t fire a puck to the net to save their lives.)
However, everyone expected more from his. Add up his giganticly inflated contract, his first year as Captain, and the departure of the other veterans (including Avery), and people expected numbers that he put up under Lindy Ruff in Buffalo (his 2 seasons in Buffalo post-lockout: 67 and 69 points… still not huge numbers).
This year, with Gaborik, Kotalik, Prospal, and Avery here, he can stop trying to score and just be a good defensive forward, which he has been. He is killing penalties and blocking a ton of shots and being a behind-the-scenes player. That’s what his role always was, and that’s what it should be.
Of course, Blair Betts did all that for 11 times less money.
2) Enver Lisin – The season is still young, but I would call trading Lauri Korpikoski for Lisin a good trade. Korpikoski scored 14 points in 68 games last year and looked lost for most of the season. Not very good for the guy drafted 10 spots ahead of Mike Green in 2004.
Lisin is fast as hell, and what’s even more surprising is that he’s keeping up with Prospal and Gaborik on the 1st line. That gives John Tortorella so many more options, including putting a struggling player – say, Chris Higgings – on the 4th line.
He’s been an exciting surprise, and I’m curious to see where he goes from here. Now let’s just hope Tortorella keeps him on the 1st line for a while, and doesn’t “Tom Renney” him back to 7 minutes a game.
By Zach Schiff August 7, 2009, at 1:49 am With Jeremy Roenick retiring today, let’s look back at the 1988 NHL Entry Draft and just marvel at how amazing it has turned out.
As per usual, the New York teams did nothing exciting. The Rangers didn’t have a 1st round pick (trying to track down what happened to it with no avail) but chose Troy Mallette and Murray Duval (no NHL games) with picks 22 and 26 in the 2nd round. Keep in mind, only 21 teams in the league at the time meant only 21 picks in the 1st round. The Islanders took Kevin Cheveldayoff 16th overall. He was one of only 2 players in the 1st round to not ever play a game in the NHL (Joey’s cousin, Kory Kocur, went 17th to Detroit).
So, how great was the first round? Look at this top 10…
1. Mike Modano
2. Trevor Linden
3. Curtis Leschyshyn
7. Martin Gelinas
8. Jeremy Roenick
9. Rod Brind’Amour
10. Teemu Selanne
So, who would you rather have? The greatest American-born player of all-time? A born-leader who played with heart and soul? A solid defenseman? A winger who played until he was 38 and made the finals with 4 different teams? A 500-plus goal scorer who drew fans to every building he was in, including remote locations like Phoenix and Los Angeles? The best faceoff man in league history who also is great on the power play and is still playing 21 years later? Or a guy who scored 76 goals in his rookie year, scored 48 three seasons ago, and is going to suit up one more time at age 39?
Also that year…
2nd Round
Tie Domi, 27th, Toronto
Tim Taylor, 36th, Washington
4th Round
Mark Recchi, 67th, Pittsburgh
Tony Amonte, 68th, Rangers
Rob Blake, 70th, Los Angeles
(Can you imagine how different the history of the NHL – and the Rangers – would be had they drafted Blake or had Recchi fallen to them? Maybe no ‘91 & ‘92 Cups for the Penguins. And definitely no “Matteau, Matteau, Matteau!” as he came over with Brian Noonan in ‘94 in a trade for Amonte.)
Keith Carney, 76th, Buffalo
Joe Juneau, 81st, Boston
5th Round
Alex Mogilny, 89th, Buffalo
6th Round
Dmitri Khristich, 120th, Washington
7th Round
Val Kamensky, 129th, Quebec
8th Round
Sean Hill, 167th, Montreal
9th Round
Tony Twist, 177th, St. Louis
10th Round
Bret Hedican, 198th, St. Louis
12th Round
Claude Lapointe, 234th, Quebec
Not a bad group of Stanley Cup winners and Olympic Gold medalists in that draft class, eh? That’s got to rank up there with the best drafts of all-time, along with 1990 (Nolan, Nedved, Primeau, Ricci, Jagr, Sydor, D. Hatcher, Brodeur, Tkachuk, Smolinski all in the 1st round) and possibly, when all is said and done, 2003 (1st rounders include M.A. Fleury, Eric Staal, Horton, Zherdev, Vanek, Michalek, Suter, Coburn, Phaneuf, Jeff Carter, A. Kostitsyn, D. Brown, Seabrook, Bernier, Parise, Getzlaf, Perry, Mike Richards, and Hugh Jessiman).
And a great career by Roenick, as well. He broke 100 points 3 straight years, and was dominant until the year before the lockout, when he dropped heavily down from his status as a point-per-game player. His year in L.A. was laughable, and his return to Phoenix was horrendous as well. But he was re-energized as a Shark the last 2 years, and in the playoffs last year against Anaheim, he was one of the 3 best Sharks out there.
Should be a first-ballot Hall of Famer, but his lack of a Cup might be the one hinderance. It shouldn’t be a real issue though; he has the numbers and the international experience to merit being in there.
(Plus, he was incredible in NHL ‘93 for Sega Genesis. Him, Chris Chelios, and Ed Belfour made the Chicago Blackhawks nearly unstoppable in the game!)
By Zach Schiff July 21, 2009, at 2:28 pm Last year, in Chris Drury’s first as Ranger’s Captain, he was flanked by Alternate Captains Scott Gomez and Markus Naslund.
This year, with Gomez jettisoned to Montreal and Naslund deciding to retire, coach John Tortorella has a big decision ahead of him. No, picking two players to wear an “A” on their jersey won’t be the difference maker in going to the Stanley Cup Finals or blowing a 3-1 series lead in the 1st round, but it could signal a changing of the guard at Madison Square Garden.
Ever since the lockout, veterans have worn the A. Jaromir Jagr, Steve Rucchin, Darius Kasparaitis were the 3 Alternates in the Captain-less 2005-06 season. Since then, Brendan Shanahan, Marty Straka, Gomez, and Naslund have worn it. All older players, all on Broadway for a short time (although Gomez’s wasn’t planned that way).
This year, Tortorella can do the easy thing and give Wade Redden (please no) or Marian Gaborik the “A”s to wear, but I hope he doesn’t. Logic says your best player should always get to be a Captain or Alternate (or, in Tom Renney’s case, your highest paid players), but it doesn’t always have to be. For example, can you guess who Washington’s Captain is? No, not Alex Ovechkin. Chris Clark is the Captain. Chris Clark, who scored 1 goal and added 5 assists in 32 games last year.
Who makes a good choice? People who’ve paid their dues, who are probably going to be Rangers for a while, and who give 100% effort every shift.
Scratch Redden off the list. Has less heart than Barry Bonds.
Scratch Gaborik off the list. First season in NY.
Scratch Michal Rozsival off the list. Probably won’t be a Ranger for the entire 3 years left on his contract (it is heavily front-loaded so any team that takes him will take a big Cap hit but won’t have to actually pay much money).
Blair Betts would’ve been a great choice. However, since he probably isn’t returning, he can’t put the “A” on his sweater. (He did last year for a few games, though.)
Brandon Dubinsky, Sean Avery, and Marc Staal would all make good choices. Avery, maybe not so great, but if he gets it, I’ll be the first to say it’s a good move. He plays hard every game, he loves being a Ranger, and we know he’s here to stay this time.
However, the 2 I think should get it are Ryan Callahan and Dan Girardi. You can’t argue with Callahan getting it, can you? He defines what a Ranger should be. Plays hard not just every game, but every shift. Scores goals. Happy to be in New York. Loves playing at MSG. Doesn’t complain. Hits everyone in sight. Doesn’t take bad penalties.
And Girardi? Well, the main reason is because he’s one of my 3 in NHL ‘09. (I’m the Captain, and Girardi and Joe Thornton are my “A”s.) But I love Girardi. I love his poise, his hitting, his passing. I love how he was undrafted and then just came out of nowhere to join the team. I remember how he was picked to the AHL All-Star Game, then got called up in late-January ‘07 and had to miss the game. He was happy to be called up, but upset his family and friends wouldn’t get to watch him in the All-Star Game. Plus, I think his talent, as of right now, is better than Staal’s. You can debate me on that, and you might be right, but I think he is a better defender right now, and if every player on the blueline played like him, this team would be a lot better than it was last year.
Just my 2 cents. Would love to hear your choices.
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