Lack of Effort Hurts Rangers in Game 3 Loss to the Bruins

With the New York Rangers down 2-0 to the Boston Bruins in the second round and back at Madison Square Garden in front of their home crowd for Game 3, one would think that the Blueshirts would have been raring to go and firing on all cylinders to get back into the series.

Unfortunately for the Rangers and their fans, neither happened as the team now finds themselves down 3-0 thanks to a 2-1 Bruins’ win. It may not have been pretty but unlike the Rangers, the Bruins worked hard, threw a lot of pucks on net and scored when they needed to.

There were several reasons why the Rangers lost this hockey game. For starters, there were several defensive miscues.

While it is okay to rely on netminder Henrik Lundqvist to make the big save, it is another thing to completely leave him alone, which is exactly what the Rangers did tonight. In the first period alone, Lundqvist made two dynamite breakaway saves to keep it at 0-0 heading into the second period and had they gone in, the game could have been a Bruins’ blowout.

During the next two periods, it was much of the same from the Rangers’ defense. The Bruins had players all over the slot, were able to get pucks to the net from all angles and were able to create shooting lanes for themselves by driving to the net and the Rangers did not seem to have an answer to any of that.

Another problem for the Rangers on the defensive side of the puck was their inability to cover the point. For the third straight game, a Bruins’ defenseman found the back of net when Johnny Boychuk scored his fourth of the postseason and his second of the series, with a shot from the point that beat Lundqvist cleanly.

Secondly, the team’s offence just was not there. The Rangers had just 24 shots on Bruins’ netminder Tuukka Rask but not many of them were of the quality variety and for most of the game, made things very easy on the Bruins’ defence and their netminder.

Speaking of the Rangers’ offence, one has to wonder where they have gone in this series. The team has not gotten much from the likes of Derrick Brassard, Derek Stepan, Ryan Callahan, Brian Boyle, Carl Hagelin, and 

Mats Zuccarello.

When the team is not getting scoring from Rick Nash, who did not play badly tonight, someone else needs to step up and start producing offensively and that is simply not happening for the Rangers right now. Through three games, the Rangers have been outscored 10-5, which is obviously not going to get it done against a much deeper Bruins hockey club.

Lastly, the Rangers’ play in the third periods of this series have been dreadful. In that particular period, the Rangers have been outscored 4-1 and in their last two games in this series, it has been their undoing.

The only positive to come out of this game for the Rangers was the play of Lundqvist. After struggling a bit in Game 2, Lundqvist was on top of his game in Game 3 and stopped 32 of 34 shots.

With the Rangers now one loss away from being swept by the Bruins, the team must find a way to score some goals and play better defense in front of their netminder. If they cannot do that on Thursday night, the lights will go out on Broadway until October.