Panarin has 2 points, Rangers hold off Hurricanes

RALEIGH, N.C. -- Artemi Panarin had a goal and an assist, and the New York Rangers defeated the Carolina Hurricanes 4-2 at Lenovo Center on Wednesday.

Noah Laba, Vincent Trocheck and Will Cuylle also scored, and Igor Shesterkin made 36 saves for the Rangers (12-11-2), who have won two in a row after losing four straight.

“We started the game the right way,” New York coach Mike Sullivan said. “Trying to play north-south, trying to put pucks behind them. When you play that way against a team like that, that wants to play on top of you, you can take them out of the game they want to play.”

Shayne Gostisbehere had a goal and an assist, and Sebastian Aho had two assists for the Hurricanes (14-7-2), who are 1-2-1 in their past four games. Frederik Andersen made 14 saves.

“We played really well. We played hard,” Carolina coach Rod Brind’Amour said. “Clearly, we needed to score on some of our chances. You can’t have that many opportunities and not come away with more than we did.”

The Rangers took a 1-0 lead at 16:53 of the first period. Taylor Raddysh sent a short backhand feed to Laba, who curled out in the right circle and buried a shot over Andersen’s blocker.

Gostisbehere tied it 1-1 with a power-play goal at 5:04 of the second period. He scored short side with a one-timer from the right circle off a cross-slot pass from Aho.

The Hurricanes, who rank 29th in the League on the power play (14.7 percent), have scored once with the man-advantage in each of their past three games (3-for-12).

“It probably helps to get a little bit of confidence if you score, but you try to win a hockey game,” Aho said. “Special teams are a part of it, but it’s not all of it.

“A couple errors here and there cost us, but the way we played was a step in the right direction.”

Panarin put the Rangers back in front 2-1 at 18:56. Immediately following a face-off win by Trocheck, J.T. Miller slid the puck back to Adam Fox, who passed diagonally down to Panarin for a one-timer five-hole from the left circle.

“I think they played a little quicker than us for the majority of the game,” said Miller, who returned after missing two games with an upper-body injury. “I thought in the third we started to play behind them and held on to pucks and had our best period. And when we did have some breakdowns, [Shesterkin] played unreal.”

Trocheck scored 45 seconds into the third period to push the lead to 3-1. Panarin skated slowly into the zone before passing back to Trocheck, who had just come off the bench and beat Andersen glove side with a slap shot from the high slot.

“They’re obviously a really hard team to play against, one of the best in the League,” Trocheck said. “They’re always on top of you. It gets frustrating at times. That’s the way they beat a lot of teams, they frustrate them to death. I thought we did a good job of staying with it and playing our game.”

Seth Jarvis cut it to 3-2 at 10:53, roofing a shot over Shesterkin’s right shoulder from the bottom of the left circle.

Cuylle scored an empty-net goal with 1:43 remaining for the 4-2 final.

“The puck is just not going in the net,” Hurricanes defenseman K'Andre Miller said. “We’re getting our chances, we’re getting shots, we’re creating looks. Obviously, they have a pretty good goalie over there. He made some pretty good saves.”

NOTES: Fox has six assists during a four-game point streak. ... K'Andre Miller, who played his first five seasons for the Rangers, was minus-1 in 24:08 of ice time in his first game against his former team. He was traded to the Hurricanes on July 1. ... Andersen is 2-6-2 with a 3.32 goals-against average and .873 save percentage in his past 10 starts.