Role reversals

Well, that was a weird weekend of hockey. Mostly, everyone did what everyone else was supposed to do.

On Saturday night, we played the Blue Jackets in Columbus. The game went back and forth pretty well, resulting in a 1-1 tie on traded power play goals after 2. That was when the Rangers skaters and King Henrik switched roles. It was the skaters who stepped up their game in the third and kept the Rangers in it. Granted, they didn't so much score any goals, but the majority of play was in the Jackets' zone, and I was actually pretty optimistic about the outcome, despite the 1-1 tie lasting late.

And it was Lundqvist, who usually spends these tied third periods standing on his head to bail out a squad that does nothing to earn it (either offensively or defensively), who himself made the awful play that gave the Blue Jackets the tiebreaker and eventual game-winner with 5 minutes left.

Now, I'd love to give Rick Nash (who scored this goal and the not-quite-empty-netter at the end, after assisting on Columbus's first goal) all the credit in the world for breaking this tie late in the third - it's the kind of thing he does, and he's the kind of guy I love giving credit to. But this was about as soft a goal as I've seen (excepting this one). "Bad-angle shot" doesn't really depict just how bad an angle it was: Nash basically shoveled it toward the left post, from the goal line at the boards, with absolutely no one else anywhere near either him or the crease.

After the game, Lundqvist unsurprisingly took full responsibility for the loss, and really, what else is there to say? Things like this happen sometimes, he's still one of the best goalies in the league, and if Hank could be our biggest liability in every game, I think we'd be doing just fine, thank you very much. For the first time I can remember, Hank making a mistake doesn't make me go back to Brooks's quote, "neither blameless nor to blame." This time, he actually was to blame. Which, all things considered, may be more a reflection of the skaters around him getting better than of anything else. Or maybe I'm a little too optimistic.

Anyway, continuing with weeeeeird hockey, last night, the Caps came to the Garden. And in another role reversal, it was the Rangers whose powerhouse offense came through for 7 goals from 6 different players (8 different Rangers had assists), while the Caps were shut out and dumbfounded. The game was almost scoreless through one until Prust opened the floodgates with 3 minutes left in the first, and then the flood itself followed in the second. The offense never stopped, and the Capitals never got started.

It was awesome!!

I don't really know what else to say about this game. Lundqvist earned himself a league lead-tying 5th shutout, mostly on hard work in the third, after the Rangers had already given him plenty of room to work with. Dubinsky had a Gordie Howe hat trick (I love that we keep earning these), fighting Ovechkin a few minutes after scoring, then assisting on Cally's first in the third. Yes, Dubinsky fought Ovechkin. It was awesome. After the game, it's worth noting Dubinsky's comments went something like "it was totally respectful, he's great at hockey, etc." cf. Crosby.

The game's final 5 minutes devolved into brawl time (in which penalties were assigned to basically everyone, except Brian Fahey, who got away with no minutes based on the NHL's "it's cool, you did it to Avery" clause), which was also fun to watch. Basically, this game was candy for my life, and everything is great.