EDMONTON, Alberta — The Rangers refuse to slow down.
Kaapo Kakko and Alexis Lafreniere scored in the shootout Friday night to finish off a valiant comeback and secure a 5-4 win over the Oilers at Rogers Place. The Rangers rallied for their seventh straight victory by scoring three unanswered goals over the second and third periods to storm back from a three-goal deficit they had fallen into during the opening 20 minutes.
It’s the first time in franchise history that the Rangers have posted multiple winning streaks of seven-plus games in the same season.
The Oilers came into the Garden in November and rallied from a 3-0 deficit to take a 4-3 win, and now the Rangers essentially have done the same thing to Edmonton in its building.
“I think we owed them a little bit,” said Adam Fox, who on his 25th birthday assisted on Chris Kreider’s goal that cut Edmonton’s lead to 4-2 in the second period and also assisted on Mika Zibanejad’s tying power-play goal in the third. “You’re never happy blowing a lead. It was nice to get a little revenge from the last time we played them.”
Head coach Gerard Gallant came into the Rangers’ dressing room between the first and second periods, when the club was trailing by three, and told his team: “We are not losing this game.” The first period was deflating, but the Rangers kept pushing and steadily crept back into the contest shift by shift.
Things could have continued to go south when the Rangers found themselves on a penalty kill just under six minutes into the second period, but Fox sprung Kreider for a shorthanded opportunity. Kreider’s pass, intended for Zibanejad, was blocked, but it came right back to him. Kreider then buried it at 6:26 of the second period for his second goal of the game.
Lafreniere, who has played some of his best hockey over the past 10 games, cut the Oilers’ lead to one by scoring from the right faceoff circle off a feed from Kakko at 1:36 of the third period.
The Rangers stayed the course and when they earned a 5-on-3 power play later in the frame, they did not flinch. Zibanejad wristed one home to knot the score at 4-4 with 6:50 left in regulation.
“We just said the game is far from over, you’ve got 40 minutes,” Gallant said. “It’s the new NHL, it’s not like the game is going to be over. We battled hard and found a way.”
The Oilers, who were forced to dress 17 skaters because Klim Kostin was sick and they having no extras due to salary cap constraints, came out with an apparent chip on their shoulders. They had their previous two games to the lowly Canadiens and Red Wings. More and more space began to open up for the Rangers as the game progressed, however, which is similar to how the first meeting between the two teams unfolded — except this time, the Rangers prevailed.
A combination of some defensive lapses and a couple of tough goals allowed by Igor Shesterkin pushed the Rangers into a 4-1 hole at the end of the first period. Based on what was said in the dressing room after the game, however, the Rangers never thought they were out of the game and never gave up on their No. 1 goaltender.
“Some of those goals, I mean, they’re whacking at it in front, there’s a guy shooting from the hash marks alone, it’s on us,” Fox said of Shesterkin’s performance. “We know what he’s capable of. He saved us there when it was 4-1 with that chance right in front and he kept playing well in overtime and in the third there, too. We know his confidence isn’t going to get shook. We owed him a little bit, too, after some breakdowns.”