Anyone else notice Henrik Lundqvist’s increasing frustration with his team?
Frustrated Lundqvist (MSG)
Something isn’t right in the Rangers locker room. After every loss, we see the same players pretty much all saying the same things. No use in repeating it because it’s all cliche sports phrases. One player however, is giving us more insight with his on ice body language, post game quotes and facial expressions.
Hank has always been revealing to me. When he’s on his game, he quickly gets up and prepares himself for the next shot. When he’s struggling, he usually looks upwards and slumps his shoulders after a goal. Right now, he appears to be on, but his teammates are not.
I’m going to cite three games in which something tells me Henrik is not happy with his teammates. Let’s begin against the Washington Capitals on Jan 9th. That’s the game the Rangers stormed back to take a 3-2 lead and the Caps tied it late and then won it in OT.
In that contest, Henrik was extremely animated and at one point YELLED at Dan Girardi to get back to his man who was standing all alone in front. He even yelled to Alain Vigneault to take a timeout late that the coach opted against. You can see how frustrated he was after the game, especially questioning the timeout and the chaos of the situation.
Incident number two came in a win against the Carolina Hurricanes last week. Dan Boyle had been high sticked and instead of shaking it off and getting back into the play, he wandered around looking for a call. To make matters worse, he screened Lundqvist and ruined his chance at a shutout. Watch the video and you can see Lundqvist slam his stick and yell at Boyle.
Finally, in yesterday’s flat line effort against the Senators he revealed a lot. In his post game interview when asked in essence about the team not being ready his eyes went wide, lips tight and he said something you can’t take back. “You have to ask my teammates.”
WOW! Here’s the full exchange.
Even Alain Vigneault was beyond frustrated and unloaded on his team yesterday. Basically giving Henrik and Jesper Fast the only pass for their efforts.
The Rangers play the Sabres tonight and it’s likely Lundqvist will get the game off after playing yesterday. Still, there appears to be a developing situation in the locker room that will either propel the Rangers to better things or threaten to implode the season.
I guess you’ll have to keep your eyes on Hank to find out.