Post-Game Talk: Kings @ Rangers [MOD WARNING POST 1]

[Glen Sathers Cigar]

This. AV and some of the players have said the same thing. Florida, Buffalo, Carolina. Games that we won while not giving much of an effort. The Florida third period was the worst period you can have without getting scored on.

Yeah, we've mostly been beating inferior opponents and not convincingly so.

It's okay, they've been finding ways to win as McD said in his post game remarks, which is good, but they know they can be better.

It won't matter one bit as long as they can play their best in the playoffs.


The most important thing is that the Rangers set the pace. When they effectively use their speed it can be overwhelming for the other team. Combine that with solid NZ play and good defense and we will be tough to beat. The only issue is firing on all cylinders at the right time. It's very hard to make it to the Stanley Cup which is my fear, so much has to break right as we saw last year and you have to be playing your best hockey. The reason last year we made it to the SCF was the team played their best hockey in the playoffs, mainly after game 4 vs Pittsburgh. In 2012 we didn't make it to the SCF because we were hanging on and winning games barely and not really setting and pace and all that. I get worried with the recent stretch because I see alot of the 2012 team in it. A lot of opportunistic scoring and defensive collapsing relying on the goaltender.

 

[Cobra Jack*]

Normally I would agree with the sentiment "it's only 1 game no big deal" but the fact that they got their butts whooped against the Kings in a game every Ranger fan had circled on their calendar concerns me. I now have to question the heart of this group. Even players who weren't here last year (Yandle etc.) should have realized how big this game was and stepped up, and nobody did. They did the opposite. You want to have a stinker game that's fine, but not this one.

I expected better. And yes I fully expected a win tonight. I thought the Rangers would make a statement tonight but they did not. I am not as confident as I was 24 hours ago that this team has what it takes to go all the way. It is not 2014. The Kings should not have pushed the Rangers around like that tonight. They are not as good as last year, and we are better. I am starting to wonder now if the Kings are in our heads.

 

[BoWmEn]

Normally I would agree with the sentiment "it's only 1 game no big deal" but the fact that they got their butts whooped against the Kings in a game every Ranger fan had circled on their calendar concerns me. I now have to question the heart of this group. Even players who weren't here last year (Yandle etc.) should have realized how big this game was and stepped up, and nobody did. They did the opposite. You want to have a stinker game that's fine, but not this one.

I expected better. And yes I fully expected a win tonight. I thought the Rangers would make a statement tonight but they did not. I am not as confident as I was 24 hours ago that this team has what it takes to go all the way. It is not 2014. The Kings should not have pushed the Rangers around like that tonight. They are not as good as last year, and we are better. I am starting to wonder now if the Kings are in our heads.

The reason I think it was just a one game thing was really if you analyze the scenario as to why they were pushed around, randomly gaving pucks away and cave in their zone like this is a Tortorella system is totally uncharactaristic of how they've played this year. Going into this game they just come of a 7-2 route of the Ducks while sitting atop the NHL with games in hand. I think maybe they took their foot off the pedal. MSL leadership could've been used for this one.

And perhaps as you say the Kings are in their head a bit (and credit to them it's like they were trolling the whole year, till crunch time.), but I think it was just flat out lack of urgency against a team with nothing but urgency. They will find that urgency come playoff time.


Anyway I think this is a good emotional outlook of the previous two games we've had.

Us against the Ducks.

Us against the Kings.

 

[failure]

I think Nash either had a minor concussion or something. After the game that he got hit in the head he had 'neck spasms' and his play dropped off dramatically. He isn't just on a dry spell, he isn't getting involved.

He looks exactly like he did last year post concussion. Somethings up.

 

[GoAwayPanarin]

Lol Nash wasn't concussed. There is NO way they let him come back as quick as he did if he had an actual concussion of any magnitude, especially with his history.


Also have we really gotten to the point where we're calling this teams "heart" into question based off of a single regular season game?


****ing Christ guys...

 

[BrianLeetch2]

This thread is laughable....There are some here questioning this teams heart? Not confident in this team? This team is way better than last years team, and is no where near the 2012 team. One game. They have a game like this round 1 game 1 then maybe worry a little bit. One loss and its time to jump off the ledge.

 

[Richter Scale]

I honestly hope he's just injured. And no I'm not wishing injury per se, but if he's not injured, then he's just doing his playoff act again, and he cannot keep doing that. Injuries heal. Inability to hack big games does not just heal.

Bolded isn't exactly true. One of the best current forwards in the game went his first 42 playoff games with a stat line of 3 goals, 12 assists. He was called a playoff choker by fans; a potential regular season star, but a guy that couldn't cut it when the games got tighter, more physical, and more important. That player's name is Pavel Datsyuk. He went on to score 36 goals and 57 assists in his next 103 playoff games. Nash's stat line through 41 playoff games is 5 goals, 13 assists.

Now Nash is definitely no Datsyuk. But the point is that sometimes it takes a player a while to figure out how to be effective in the playoffs. And that that actually IS something that can be learned, in my opinion. I'm not willing to say that Nash can't cut it in the playoffs yet; but (as I said after last season) he's getting to the end of his leash.

--

After looking at his shot charts for the games he has played since the "neck spasms" (see my post in the Nash thread if you're interested in the details), and comparing them with his shot charts in all the games prior to it this season... I'm pretty concerned. Yea, it's a small sample size. But it also shows a pretty distinct difference (more than a 20 percentage point drop in shots/tips from the slot). And it shows - in my mind anyway - that this isn't just a stretch of bad luck or things not breaking his way. It bears out what people are seeing; he isn't going to the dirty areas and isn't paying the price to get in prime scoring positions.

Now, none of us know why that is. Is it mental? Is it physical? Is he injured? Is he just not trying so hard because the team is in a good playoff position and he's trying to rest up before the playoffs? Who knows. What I know is that this better be temporary. Yes, scoring chances are going to dry up in the playoffs; it's the nature of that game. But if he's not - for whatever reason - able to get to those areas, they're going to utterly evaporate for him; and he'll be the offensive passenger that he was last year (yes, he was good defensively - that's not enough from a forward who is being paid for so much more).

--

By no means am I freaking out after this loss. Whatever; move on. Get to playoffs - ideally in first, but if not, who cares. Playoffs will be a different animal. That said, my biggest concerns going into the playoffs, in order, are:

- McDonagh being the McDonagh we all want him to be and not the jekyll and hyde act we've been watching all season. One good game, followed by two horrendous games, and then three fine but utterly normal games. Not gonna cut it. Need him to get back to form and stay there.

- Nash. By no means am I writing him off; but his recent play is a concern. If he doesn't step it up in the playoffs this year, this team will have problems - maybe not in the first round necessarily; but certainly after that.

- Hank being rusty. All we can do is wait and see. I have faith in him when he's at full form. But we all know how utterly mediocre a rusty Hank can be. Nervous he's not going to have enough time to shake the rust off before the playoffs start.

- Stepan. I think he'll get it back. But now is not the time I want to be seeing a 12 game pointless streak from a guy who is supposed to be our 1C.


--

To try to end on a positive note; here are the things I'm eagerly anticipating going into the playoffs:

- Yandle getting into sync with the team.

- Klein's return. Hunwick isn't bad; but Klein this season was just bringing so much more and will stabilize the back-end further.

- Hopefully continuing to get solid contribution from the young blood: Hayes, Miller, and Fast. If Nash doesn't step it up, this will be absolutely crucial.

- Getting MSL back, even if he hasn't been fantastic this season. His presence will just help to round out the lineup and balance it further. And his leadership will be a benefit.

- Finally getting T-Glass out of the lineup? Maybe? Pretty please? A guy can dream.

 

[Richter Scale]

And yeah our possession stats suck. So do Shea Weber's. It's not everything.

DET - 700 billion OT losses

That's every potential playoff team in the league and they all have at least one gigantic wart. That's why it's a parity league. That's why they play the games.

They actually do pretty well in OT itself. They have 3 OT wins and no losses in the actual overtime period (Edit: Until Howard's awful performance against AZ). The Wings have just been abysmal at shootouts; which lucky for them are not in the playoffs... so not the best choice of weakness.

Better choices: They're struggling with a number of pretty significant injuries (as has been an unfortunate trend for them the past few seasons leading into the POs). Also, they've been on a pretty bad cold streak the past couple weeks and Howard has shown some weakness since returning from injury.

 

[Rangers ftw]

Stepan-Nash-Kreider with another stealth mode performance. Zucc.Brassard-Miller at least tried to do some. Well, can't win them all, but would have loved to win this one.

 

[aufheben]

This team has me so ****ing nervous.

 

[Ola]

Normally I would agree with the sentiment "it's only 1 game no big deal" but the fact that they got their butts whooped against the Kings in a game every Ranger fan had circled on their calendar concerns me. I now have to question the heart of this group. Even players who weren't here last year (Yandle etc.) should have realized how big this game was and stepped up, and nobody did. They did the opposite. You want to have a stinker game that's fine, but not this one.

I expected better. And yes I fully expected a win tonight. I thought the Rangers would make a statement tonight but they did not. I am not as confident as I was 24 hours ago that this team has what it takes to go all the way. It is not 2014. The Kings should not have pushed the Rangers around like that tonight. They are not as good as last year, and we are better. I am starting to wonder now if the Kings are in our heads.

Look, LAK really pwns us when it comes to the battles infront of both nets, and not only us more like most teams in the NHL.

But this is problematic. When they put a puck on our net, they have 3 guys hammering away on Talbot. Natrually that upsets us and we want to pay back. I counted the times this game, we manage to get in on the net like that twice, LA just short of 20. When we do, out guys are *****. Think Doughty laying on top of Fast for example.

I remember G1 during the SCFs, like 15 minutes in Norstrom who worked the game for Swedish TV said something like NYR will have no chance to win this series if they cannot push away more to keep the LA players outside the crease. And just as importantly, we are not able to get to the net on the other side. It's like skating into a meat sheild.

We can talk about giveaways, BUT it's a huge misstake to do so. Huge misstake. The big difference between us and LA is that the later can creat offense against us by just putting the puck deep and going after us, while we have to play really really well against their outstanding defense. We will make misstakes, they won't -- because of that. Turnovers is a symptom not the problem.

 

[Zucc36]

Really concerned about Nash. Seriously, it does not look good. He needs to find his game. Now.

 

[Ail]

And the 2012 team was a chore to watch but they still got to round 3. We're still in as a good a position as anybody. Yes we have holes. Us and 30 other teams.

Yes, but the point is, even without the support of the numbers back then some people knew that team was playing well above its head and that it would eventually hit a wall. I am surprised it took getting to the ECF.

 

[KOVALEV022473]

All I can say is, thank God we got rid of that scrub floater, Gaborik!

 

[NikC]

Look, LAK really pwns us when it comes to the battles infront of both nets, and not only us more like most teams in the NHL.

But this is problematic. When they put a puck on our net, they have 3 guys hammering away on Talbot. Natrually that upsets us and we want to pay back. I counted the times this year, we manage to get in on the net like that twice, LA just short of 20. When we do, out guys are *****. Think Doughty laying on top of Fast for example.

I remember G1 during the SCFs, like 15 minutes in Norstrom who worked the game for Swedish TV said something like NYR will have no chance to win this series if they cannot push away more to keep the LA players outside the crease. And just as importantly, we are not able to get to the net on the other side. It's like skating into a meat sheild.

We can talk about giveaways, BUT it's a huge misstake to do so. Huge misstake. The big difference between us and LA is that the later can creat offense against us by just putting the puck deep and going after us, while we have to play really really well against their outstanding defense. We will make misstakes, they won't -- because of that. Turnovers is a symptom not the problem.

Looks like they still know how to beat us, and that A and his team have no answers. ... still.

 

[SixGoalieSystem]

Looks like they still know how to beat us, and that A and his team have no answers. ... still.

Not like we beat them in January or anything.

 

[Ail]

All I can say is, thank God we got rid of that scrub floater, Gaborik!

Considering how good Brassard turned out to be, it's hard to dislike that trade. Not to mention Moore was part of the Yandle deal.

I loved Gaborik, and he got Tortorella'd, but it wasn't a bad trade.

 

[blue425]

Anyway I think this is a good emotional outlook of the previous two games we've had.

Us against the Ducks.

Us against the Kings.

Buy a Sega Saturn or you will die!

 

[OnlyTruth]

I think Nash either had a minor concussion or something. After the game that he got hit in the head he had 'neck spasms' and his play dropped off dramatically. He isn't just on a dry spell, he isn't getting involved.

He looks exactly like he did last year post concussion. Somethings up.

You are probably right about Nash. I was thinking the same. There is a clear pattern here. If gets hit hard in a game, his performance goes down. I see it season after season. I hope this is not going to be Gaborik type of situation.

 

[GordonGecko]

Today is bizarro world, usually everyone is killing the team and I'm one of the few looking past it, but today is mostly people saying "it's just one game, they wee due". Last night was inexcusable, they completely mailed it in. They already laid an egg against the Hurricanes and the Panthers before then, they were just lucky enough to pull 4 points out. This is turning into a pattern, not good going into the playoffs. There was a huge lack of effort and concentration last night. It's like after Zuccs scored they figured they could coast and nobody hustled and the D-Men didn't own their assignments. It was turnover after turnover and the Kings skated wherever they felt like it. And this was against LA who they could have really drove a nail into their coffin for. So annoying

 

[OnlyTruth]

This team has me so ****ing nervous.

Why? Because of one loss? We are on the top of the NHL. I can only imagine what u felt in prior years. I mean you cant win 82 games. There will be off nights. Thats why in the playoffs there are 7 games.

 

[The Gloaming]

The Rangers didn't push the pace of the game and got sucked into a dump and chase/collapsing defense affair. Looked like a Torts team out there. There seems to be less defensive pressure from the Rangers in the past few games. That is not the way they're supposed to play. They never started moving their legs and paid the price for it. Maybe this game will serve as a wake up call. Hard to fix things in your game when what you're doing right now is getting you wins.

 

[Raspewtin]

If they clean up this garbage by the playoffs, obviously all is forgiven.

But the overall defensive structure of this team the past month is giving me an aneurysm.

 

[Ola]

Looks like they still know how to beat us, and that A and his team have no answers. ... still.

Yeah, and it is a bit problematic. Two more things, firstly our man-man defense really enables us to counter attack with speed. When our Ds get to a puck in our end they do so with a lot of speed, they can easily get 15 feets within a sec or two and that open things up for us when we make our first pass. If you look at like Philly or NJ playing or a team like that, when a D on their team gets the puck he aint getting more than 6 feets before he makes a pass. Its real easy for a forechecker to pick the passing lanes.

But, a bunch of wingers on LA makes our Ds look like they really are running around and they get possession on our guys real well. Its not unusual at all that we have one D on the right side, then THREE black and white players and then two of our guys on the back of two of their forwards. And they get these situations just by putting the puck on the net, its so easy for them.

Secondly, we have decent size on our blueline, we just must get nastier infront of our net. If the team sat down and watched this game on video and looked at this, and especially compared to how it looks at the other end, a lot of players would have some WTF moments. LAK don't take penalties infront of their end, and they are really manhandling our forwards. Our D's let their guys stand and poke 5-10 times on the glove and pads of Talbot 4-5 times per period.

 

[Ail]

Why? Because of one loss?

No.

We are on the top of the NHL.

Same could be said for other teams who have fizzled out early in the playoffs. Same could be said for the 2012 team which scraped their way to the ECF only to get completely outmatched by the Devils. This team is superior to the 2012 team, but I'm starting to wonder if they can be considered superior to last year's team as previously thought. It goes beyond one loss. Regular season success can be deceiving. We'll see how things go leading up to the playoffs and once this team is healthy again.

I can only imagine what u felt in prior years. I mean you cant win 82 games. There will be off nights. Thats why in the playoffs there are 7 games.

I'm not sure why skepticism and concern over performance always gets boiled down to "you're only going to be happy if they go 82-0!"

There will be off nights, yes. There will be losses, certainly. However I'd be much less concerned if when they lost games, they actually showed up and didn't get dominated by the other team. You can lose games where you play well. It still stings, but it's much more acceptable. The same can be said of winning. There have been several games over the past month where they won, but at the end of the night you still had a sour taste in your mouth. Some people are just happy to see the W, and that's fine, but some of us don't look at every win as an ultimate success. You know who else looks at wins/losses that way? Players and coaches. Winning and losing goes beyond the points in the standings.

Again, I'm reserving judgment of this team until they get healthy, but it's not just injuries that are causing them to get outplayed.