‘Just not good enough’: Rangers look for answers after loss to Wild
“Spectacular play. Better save.”
MSG analyst Dave Maloney’s four-word analysis of Minnesota Wild goaltender Filip Gustavsson’s highway robbery on a third-period Grade A+ scoring opportunity by New York Rangers forward Mika Zibanejad said it all on Monday night.
The Rangers needed less than a minute of play to end their home scoring drought at 180:57 – the problem was that Artemi Panarin’s goal was the only one the Rangers scored in a disheartening 3-1 loss at Madison Square Garden.
The Wild, who had lost the first three games (0-2-1) of a five-game trip, tied the score less than five minutes later on a goal by defenseman Jonas Brodin and dominated play for the rest of the period. They earned three of the game’s four power plays. Though Igor Shesterkin made 29 saves and was superb again in goal, he was on his back and defenseless when rookie Danila Yurov scored his first NHL goal at 8:16 of the third period to give the Wild a 2-1 lead. Kirill Kaprizov’s empty-netter added insult to injury.
Meanwhile, the Rangers fired blanks for the remaining 59-plus minutes after Panarin’s goal and dropped to 0-4-0 at the Garden and 3-4-1 overall.
To say that coach Mike Sullivan was disappointed by his team’s play was an understatement.
“We scored early, which was great,” Sullivan said afterward. “But I thought we got outplayed. We got outplayed all night.
“We knew we were going to play a team that was going to come in with urgency based on circumstance, and we didn’t match the urgency. That was the challenge. We got outplayed tonight.”
‘Narrative’ different in most recent Rangers’ loss
The Rangers were coming off a 4-3 road win against the Montreal Canadiens on Saturday that followed three games in which they dominated play but were 0-2-1 because they were foiled by outstanding goaltending.
Gustavsson, who lost his previous three games after an opening-night shutout, was excellent, especially with the glove save on Zibanejad’s point-blank net-front redirection off a pass from Panarin midway through the third period.
“I have to score on that one,” Zibanejad said.
But the Rangers were outshot 16-6 in the first period, and the Wild had a 12-4 advantage in high-danger scoring chances through the first 40 minutes, according to Natural Stat Trick.
Scoring one goal against a team that allowed 22 in its previous five games left Sullivan disappointed, to say the least. It was the Rangers’ poorest showing since their dreadful 3-0 loss to the Pittsburgh Penguins at the Garden on opening night two weeks ago.
“From that point (opening night) on, up until this game, I’ve felt like the team has played extremely well and generated a significant amount of offense,” Sullivan explained. “We didn’t get rewarded for it on some nights, but it wasn’t a case of disconnect or not getting looks.
“I didn’t think we got as many looks tonight, but we didn’t play as well. That’s different. So the narrative is very (different) tonight than it’s been in the last couple of weeks.”
Captain J.T. Miller, who couldn’t convert on a couple of Grade-A chances, wasn’t happy with his team’s overall play but said the game was winnable.
“We’ve got to find a way to bear down in those tight 2-1 games when, let’s be honest, we didn’t deserve to win, but that was a game we could have stolen,” he said. “It’s happened to us so far, just not good enough. We know that. We’re gonna turn the page and move on to the next one.”
Losing “the next one” to the San Jose Sharks at home on Thursday would send alarms blaring at the Garden. The Sharks were last in the overall standings in 2024-25 and are 0-3-2 as they begin an eastern trip against the New York Islanders on Tuesday. The Sharks have some nice young talent, but they’re allowing five goals a game.
It’s early in the season to call any Rangers game a “must-win,” but this is as close as you’ll find in October — especially with a four-game western swing beginning Sunday in Calgary.
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