Following his team’s loss to Alex Ovechkin and the Capitals Friday in Washington, acting Rangers coach Kris Knoblauch didn’t think there was a whole lot he needed to change for Saturday’s game against the Capitals, just maybe a tweak or two, here or there.
"I think there were some things that we just felt that we could be better at,’’ Knoblauch said before the Rangers closed out the two-game set in the nation’s capital. "Overall, we liked our effort (and) our execution was pretty good. But we just felt that maybe we could take advantage of some things.’’
One of the things the Rangers were able to take advantage of this time was the surging Mika Zibanejad, who finally seems to be coming out of the season-long funk he’d been in. It was Zibanejad who broke the tie with 2:32 remaining in regulation and push the Rangers to a 3-1 victory over the Caps that allowed them to earn a split of the series.
Zibanejad, who had busted out with a three-goal, three-assist night in Wednesday’s 9-0 win over the Philadelphia Flyers at Madison Square Garden, scored the winner when he pushed Washington defenseman Brenden Dillon off the puck in the Caps' end, then whipped a sharp angle shot over the left shoulder of Washington goalie Ilya Samsonov for his seventh goal of the season, and fourth in three games.
Zibanejad then had a crucial blocked shot as the Capitals tried furiously to tie the game with their goalie pulled for the extra skater, before Brett Howden’s empty-net goal sealed the victory.
The Capitals, riding a seven-game winning streak without their bruising winger Tom Wilson, had been boosted by the return of Wilson from his seven-game suspension for boarding and injuring Bruins defenseman Brandon Carlo in a game March 5. Wilson’s effect on the game was minimal, though he did have an assist on John Carlson’s third-period goal that had tied the score, 1-1.
"Obviously he's a very good hockey player, has some physicality and can score goals,’’ Knoblauch said of the 6-4, 220-pound Wilson. "I'm just worried about how our team plays, and our execution. They're a better team with him, so we'll have to raise our game.’’
Wilson had been allowed to practice with the Capitals during his suspension, so he perhaps wasn’t as rusty as he might have been. However, he had little impact through the first two periods. He slipped and fell and accidentally took Libor Hajek into the end boards in the first period, prompting Brendan Smith to smack him with a glove while he was down on the ice, but the biggest thing Wilson contributed was intercepting an ill-advised drop pass from Pavel Buchnevich on a three-on-one break midway through the second period.
Just as they had the night before, the Rangers held a 1-0 lead after two periods. This time, it was Buchnevich who had scored, at 17:49 of the first period, driving the net and popping in another pretty centering feed from Adam Fox. The goal was Buchnevich’s 11th of the season, and the assist the 50th of Fox’s career, in his 99th game.
Long Island native Keith Kinkaid, starting his fourth game of the season net, made 28 saves to earn his second win. He had to survive four looks at the Caps’ power play, ranked sixth in the NHL with a 27% success rate. However, the Rangers’ penalty kill, ranked third in the league coming in, with a kill rate of 86%, had killed all nine man advantages they’d faced in their three previous games against Washington, and they were able to snuff all four in this one.
