Dubois, Blue Jackets defeat Rangers in overtime

NEW YORK -- Pierre-Luc Dubois scored 31 seconds into overtime, and the Columbus Blue Jackets extended their season-long winning streak to five games by defeating the New York Rangers 4-3 at Madison Square Garden on Thursday.

Blue Jackets defenseman Zach Werenski tied the game at 3-3 with 2:20 remaining in the third period, 2:16 after Columbus (22-12-3) wiped a would-be Rangers goal off the board with a successful coach's challenge.
"It's a crazy up and down," Dubois said. "I thought New York's] third goal was kind of my fault, and then two shifts later they make it what would have been 4-2, so you're kind of down on yourself a little bit. They reverse it because of an offside, so it's like a message that you got lucky this time, make it count. Zach scored a really important goal. It was kind of a rollercoaster."
***[WATCH: [All Blue Jackets vs. Rangers highlights]*
Oliver Bjorkstrand and David Savard also scored for the Blue Jackets. Joonas Korpisalo made 19 saves for his first win since Nov. 15 in his first start since Dec. 11.
Chris Kreider had two goals, Jimmy Vesey scored, and Kevin Hayes had two assists to extend his point streak to eight games (five goals, 10 assists) for the Rangers. Henrik Lundqvist made 25 saves.

The Rangers (15-14-7) extended their point streak at home to seven games, but they have only two wins in those games (2-0-5).
"It's a detail here and there from taking these games in regulation," Kreider said.
Kreider scored his second of the game to give the Rangers a 3-2 lead with 7:54 remaining in the third period.

New York thought it extended the lead to 4-2 with 4:36 remaining, but the Blue Jackets issued a coach's challenge for offside and video replay showed Ryan Strome was offside prior to scoring, leaving the score 3-2.
"Once they overturned it we had that life on the bench," Werenski said. "We knew it was just one shot and we had the game tied up. From that point forward we had some momentum."
Columbus took advantage by tying the game at 3-3 when Werenski scored off an offensive zone face-off win by Boone Jenner in the left circle. His shot hit off Rangers defenseman Marc Staal and changed direction, fooling Lundqvist.

"It's a tough bounce," Staal said. "The guy is shooting two feet wide and it hits me right in the leg. That's the way it went."
The Rangers gave them the offensive zone face-off by icing the puck three seconds earlier.
"There were situations that we had chances to get the puck out and we didn't execute what we're supposed to do," Rangers coach David Quinn said. "We end up spending a little bit of time in our end and then we took an icing. It's learning how to win."
Dubois won it with a strong individual effort. He collected the puck in the neutral zone, skated around Hayes in the offensive zone to the net and flipped the puck in off Lundqvist.
"I think he sees that it's Hayes that he's attacking and he licked his chops as far as trying to take it to that forward," Columbus coach John Tortorella said. "That's what you do at 3-on-3 when you get a forward trying to play defense, trying to skate backward, you've got an advantage when you're an offensive player. Then he continued to take it to the net."
Bjorkstrand gave the Blue Jackets a 1-0 lead with his fifth of the season at 9:17 of the first period. The Rangers tied it 1-1 at 13:59 when Vesey scored his 10th off a feed from Hayes on a 2-on-1 rush against Werenski.
Columbus made it 2-1 on Savard's blocker-side shot from the top of the right circle at 16:08. It was Savard's second goal of the season.

The Rangers tied it 2-2 at 1:45 of the second period when Kreider deflected Mats Zuccarello's wrist shot from the left point seven seconds into a power play.
"That goal being overturned gave us new life, and we found a way to get two points out of it," Werenski said.

They said it

"It's huge points. We talk about it all the time. We've got to keep getting those points, they're going to mean a lot at the end of the season. We've just got to keep plugging along, getting those points." -- Blue Jackets forward Oliver Bjorkstrand

"That's a tough one. That's a tough one because we're that close from it being a two-goal win and it ends up swinging the other way." -- Rangers forward Chris Kreider

Need to know

The Blue Jackets have won four in a row on the road, all against Metropolitan Division opponents (Philadelphia Flyers twice, New Jersey Devils and Rangers). … The Blue Jackets also had a seven-game point streak (5-0-2) from Nov. 4-17. … Columbus improved to 4-2 in games decided in overtime. The Rangers are 1-5. … Hayes has six multipoint games in his streak. … Kreider has goals in three straight games and five in his past five games.

What's next

Blue Jackets: Host the Toronto Maple Leafs on Friday (7 p.m. ET; ESPN+, FS-O, SNO, NHL.TV)
Rangers: At the Nashville Predators on Saturday (8 p.m. ET; ESPN+, FS-TN, MSG 2, NHL.TV)