Rangers blow lead late, top Ducks in shootout

ANAHEIM -- Brett Howden had a goal and an assist, and the New York Rangers rebounded for a 3-2 shootout win against the Anaheim Ducks after allowing the tying goal late in the third period at Honda Center on Thursday.

Alexandar Georgiev made 28 saves in his third start of the season for the Rangers (5-7-1), who won their second straight shootout to finish their four-game Western Conference trip 2-2-0.
Mats Zuccarello and Mika Zibanejad scored in the shootout for New York. Georgiev made the save on Ryan Getzlaf in the top of the second round after Pontus Aberg missed the net in the first.
WATCH: [All Rangers vs. Ducks highlights]
"We were skating hard," Zuccarello said. "That's a good team over there. They don't give up much. That was a hard-fought two points today, and I thought to end the road trip like this is real good."
Anaheim's Rickard Rakell tied the game 2-2 with 26 seconds left in the third and the extra attacker on after goalie John Gibson was pulled with 2:01 remaining.

Getzlaf was at the right point when he spotted Rakell open in the left face-off circle. Getzlaf got the pass through, and Rakell scored with a one-timer.
"[Getzlaf] made a great play," Rakell said. "I tried to find an open space. It was a perfect pass."
Gibson made 22 saves for the Ducks (5-6-3), who have lost seven in a row, one shy of the Anaheim record, set Oct. 12-30, 1996, and matched Nov. 3-20, 2005.
"A lot of good things happened with our group," Ducks coach Randy Carlyle said. "We were a much better hockey club, a much different hockey club, tonight than we were in the previous six or seven games."
Howden gave New York a 2-1 lead when he scored off a touch pass from Jimmy Vesey at 14:29 of the second period.

The Rangers regained possession of the puck in the Ducks zone after Anaheim failed to clear, and New York defenseman Marc Staal played it toward the net from the left point. Vesey was to the left of the crease and redirected it to Howden, who was cutting through the slot.
Georgiev made the save on Kiefer Sherwood on a breakaway at 5:22 of the first period to keep it 0-0.
Kevin Hayes gave the Rangers a 1-0 lead with a power-play goal at 1:42 of the second. With Aberg in the penalty box for hooking defenseman Neal Pionk in the Anaheim zone, Gibson made the save on Kevin Shattenkirk at 1:38. New York kept the pressure on before Filip Chytil's pass from behind the net bounced off Howden's stick to Hayes behind him in the left circle.
The Ducks tied it 1-1 at 12:31 when Jakob Silfverberg batted in the rebound of a Rakell shot on the power play.

They said it

"This is not easy, this long of a trip, the last game. You could sense it in practice yesterday that we didn't have a lot of life. I'm going to focus on the way we played for 60 minutes and just found a way and gutted it out. You could just tell a lot of guys didn't have a lot of energy." -- Rangers coach David Quinn
"This was the best game we've played defensively in a long time. It was an improvement, that's for sure. Now it's a matter of getting the offense clicking and spending more time in the [offensive] zone. We didn't get the result we wanted tonight, but we got a point. It's a process." -- Ducks forward Jakob Silfverberg

Need to know

Howden has four points (one goal, three assists) in the past four games after he had four (two goals, two assists) the first nine games of the season. He has two goals and five assists in seven road games but one goal in six home games. ... Hayes has five points (two goals, three assists) in his past seven games at Anaheim. ... The seven-game losing streak is the longest for the Ducks since they were 0-6-1 from Nov. 13-27, 2011. Carlyle was fired Nov. 30, 2011, and rehired in June 14, 2016. ... Getzlaf had two assists and has seven points (two goals, five assists) in a four-game point streak. ... Anaheim forward Patrick Eaves played his first NHL game since Oct 13, 2017. Eaves, who had shoulder surgery after being sidelined by an illness, did not have a shot on goal in 10:17.

What's next

Rangers: Host the Buffalo Sabres on Sunday (7 p.m. ET, MSG+, MSG-B, NHL.TV)
Ducks: Host the Columbus Blue Jackets on Sunday (9 p.m. ET, PRIME, FS-O, NHL.TV)