Rangers believe loss to Panthers ‘was on us’

While everyone would have loved to see the New York Rangers extend their season-opening point streak to seven games, that run stopped with a 3-1 loss to the Florida Panthers on Thursday night.
It wasn’t so much the loss that stung, but the fact that the Rangers seemingly came out flat against the team that eliminated them in the Eastern Conference Final last season, the defending Stanley Cup champions nonetheless. If the Rangers sought revenge, they were unable to find it.
If you ask the Rangers players, the resounding answer is that this loss was completely self-inflicted. It had less to do with what the Panthers but rather the Rangers made mistakes and didn’t play to their standards, beating themselves.
“I think we were pretty sloppy there, pretty much all game, right from the start,” Adam Fox said following the game. ” We gave them chances, gave them odd-man rushes, and execution definitely wasn’t there.”
Fox wasn’t exaggerating when he said “right from the start.” The Rangers first lapse came just 44 seconds into the game when Anton Lundell was left wide open in front of New York’s net, and had no problem cashing in on the feed from Sam Reinhart to give Florida an early 1-0 lead.
The Rangers gave up another goal just two minutes later, as a poor clearing attempt combined with weak defensive play allowed Carter Verhaeghe to skate in with time and space to bury one from the left circle, putting Florida up 2-0.
New York spent the rest of the game playing catch-up, and never really did.
“I think most of it was (self-inflicted) tonight,” explained Mika Zibanejad. “The second and third we were hurting ourselves, from the breakouts to the neutral zone, we don’t make them go the 200 feet. We’re making it a little bit too easy on them and it’s a good enough team to take advantage of that. At least we can look at it and say ‘it was on us’ and be ready for Saturday (against the Anaheim Ducks).”
Related: 3 Rangers takeaways from 3-1 loss to Panthers
Rangers ‘didn’t play very well’ in first regulation loss of season

After a decent start to the season with two goals and four assists in his first six games, Zibanejad failed to register a single shot attempt — much less on goal — in the loss to the Panthers. On top of that, the Rangers power play was 0-for-4, with Zibanejad and company stymied at every turn.
The Rangers fought back with a goal from Alexis Lafreniere and stayed close thanks to Igor Shesterkin’s strong play in goal. But there was nothing he could do a perfect Sam Bennett deflection in the second period.
“We didn’t play very well,” said a very abrupt Chris Kreider. “I mean they’re a good team, but it didn’t matter who we played tonight because we would have given the other team a lot of chances.”
In the final two periods, the Rangers were outchanced by the Panthers 18-5, per Natural Stat Trick.
When asked what the Rangers didn’t do well enough, the answer was seemingly everything.
“Pass the puck, skate for each other, support each other, exit the zone cleanly, defend,” mentioned Kreider. “Our goaltending was good.”
That seemed to be the lone bright spot in the self-inflicted loss for New York. Shesterkin didn’t have much of a chance on the three goals against, and still made 26 saves, some in spectacular fashion.
Saturday marks a chance for the Rangers to get right back on track when they host the Ducks, an opponent not nearly as difficult to play against as the Panthers.
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