The New York Rangers have completed the comeback. After losing Game 5 to fall down 3-2 in this series, the Rangers punched back to win Games 6 and 7 to advance to the Eastern Conference Finals.
The Rangers started early with two first-period power-play goals from Adam Fox and Chris Kreider. Kreider’s goal was an absolutely beautiful redirect on Mika Zibanejad‘s shot:
Ryan Strome added another for the Rangers in the latter half of the second. The story through the first and second was Igor Shesterkin though. The relentless tendie stopped all 28 shots he had faced so far, keeping the Rangers in a comfortable 3-0 lead. He was getting significant help from the guys in front of them though, Rangers were blocking shots left and right.
Kreider added to the Rangers’ steady lead in the early third period. That was his second of the game and 8th of the playoffs. Sadly, Shesterkin’s shutout was ended by the Hurricane’s power play in the following few minutes and all of a sudden the Canes looked like they started to get some hope back –
Then Filip Chytil swooped in and nipped those hopes in the bud with a goal 40 seconds later.
The Canes grabbed one more in the final four minutes but Andrew Copp evened it out by sealing this game at 6-2 with an empty netter.
Tonight’s star of the show, as it has been all postseason, was Igor Shesterkin. He stopped 37 of 39 shots on net. The whole Rangers squad was buzzing tonight. They were all in, their sticks were hot, Ryan Lindgren was eating shots like it was fun, he blocked 4 in total.
I wanted the Rangers to win this series so bad. They’ve proven once again that they are a team that should be taken seriously. Their roster is relentless in every game, their goaltending is magical, and they’re a group of players that trust one another to give it their all. They beat Tampa all three times they played them this season, Shesterkin was killer in those, and they outscored them 10-4 which is pretty damn good. I would love to see the Rangers move onto the Stanley Cup Final.
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Featured Image: New York Rangers Twitter
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