Recap: Rangers Head Into Break After Shootout Loss to Flyers

The Rangers had to know that they would not go undefeated in shootouts this season, that at some point all the medicine they had been serving teams would be turned around on them. But with all the extra points that have been handed out at Madison Square Garden in the month of December, it's exasperating to the Rangers not to be grabbing a larger share of the pie.
For the fourth time in their five December Garden games, the Rangers took it to overtime on Sunday night, this time falling to the Philadelphia Flyers, 3-2, after a four-round shootout in the final game before the NHL's three-day Christmas break. The Rangers had begun 2018-19 winning their first five shootouts of the season, but since have lost their last two.
And yet it was another night on which the Rangers grabbed a point: They have points in six of their last eight games overall. But five of those games have reached overtime, and the Rangers have left the extra point on the table in four of them (2-2-4).

"Losing a lot of close games, overtime, shootout, drains you a little bit, I'm not going to lie," Henrik Lundqvist said. "It's a little tough to feel like you're doing the right things but it's not paying off. You've just got to accept that it's been bouncing a little bit the wrong way I guess. But at the same time, you've got to earn them."
"Shootout's a shootout, everybody knows what that is," Marc Staal said. "It's just frustrating when you don't come out on the other end of that."
It was extra frustrating given that the evening came to a close when Kevin Hayes pushed his shootout attempt just wide of Michal Neuvirth's net; Hayes had deked Neuvirth out of the play but was dealing with a rolling puck and lost the handle as he tried to steer it home.

Hayes, though, once again was one of the main reasons the Rangers earned a point - extending his career-high points streak to seven games with a magnificent setup of Chris Kreider's team-leading 17th goal - and so was Boo Nieves, who produced the game's final tie and its signature moment with his first goal of the season off a steal and setup from Lias Andersson.
"It's been a long road back for me, two pretty bad injuries and I've battled my way back," said Nieves, who was playing his fourth game with the Rangers this season after beginning the year dealing with a concussion suffered during preseason. "It definitely meant a lot. But at the same time, at the end of the day, it's still a bittersweet feeling not getting the win."
Lundqvist, starting in goal for the first time in seven days after Alexandar Georgiev had taken consecutive starts this week, stopped 29 shots over 65 minutes, then the first three Flyers in the shootout before Nolan Patrick flung one past him in Round 4. Neuvirth (32 saves) was 4-for-4 against the Rangers' shooters, with a little help from the rolling puck.
"We just didn't score," David Quinn said of the shootout. "(Lundqvist) did his part."
Kreider scored in the opening period and Nieves in the third, sandwiched around Philadelphia goals from Michael Raffl (his first of the season, too, in his 21st game) and Wayne Simmonds (his 11th) as the Flyers improved to 2-0 against the Rangers this season, and 3-1 under interim coach Scott Gordon.

The Rangers, meanwhile, will go into the Christmas break with points in 13 of their last 14 home games since late October (9-1-4), with a Garden date against the Columbus Blue Jackets awaiting on Thursday.
"I felt we battled well - really felt we would get the two points. We need it," Lundqvist said. "Take this break and regroup, and realize how desperate we need to be coming back. I think the last two, three games have been a step in the right direction for us playing smarter hockey. … That's going to give us a better chance of winning."
With both teams having played and traveled the day before, it was a game of feeling one another out over the opening two periods - not unlike, as Quinn noted, the Rangers' previous home game, when they turned a 1-0 third-period deficit into a 3-1 win over Anaheim.
This time, though, it was the Rangers who were on the board midway through the first, when Hayes yet again made a standout play. He poked a puck around Ivan Provorov at the Ranger line and was off to the races, but before hitting the Flyer line he spun a 180 to whip the puck across to Kreider, who was steaming down the middle - Kreider stretched out to settle it and then flicked one past Neuvirth for his third goal in four games and a 1-0 Ranger lead.
Raffl - who had a chance wiped out in the first period when Freddy Claesson raced him down from behind - evened things up 1:46 after first intermission, creating a 2-on-1 off a Flyers defensive-zone faceoff win and snapping one past Lundqvist from the right wing.
Early in the third, the Rangers were whistled for too many men, a problem that has plagued them this season. And the Flyers took eight seconds of the power play to grab their first lead when Sean Couturier's redirection hit iron but fell for Simmonds at 5:01.
But then came the quick answer from Nieves, just 22 seconds later. It started with his own offensive-zone faceoff win, and when Andersson charged into the corner to rub out Travis Sanheim and take over the puck, Nieves set himself in the slot and cranked home his rookie linemate's feed, then pumped his fist and leaped into the glass.
"Lias did a really good job going into the corner and taking the body, and their guy coughed up the puck," Nieves said. "Their D was on an island, and Lias made a really good pass - all I had to do was just kind of tap it in."
"Lias makes a great play - he plays heavy and makes a nice pass," Staal said. "(Nieves) was excited, and I was happy for him. He's worked hard for that."
The Rangers had glorious chances to win it late - Brett Howden was denied storming into the slot with four minutes to go, and then with 70 seconds left it was Pavel Buchnevich's turn, dancing through four Flyers across the middle and trying to outwait Neuvirth, who managed to put his shoulder to Buchnevich's shot.
And so the stalemate carried into overtime, then the shootout. And the Rangers carry themselves into the break with points in six straight home games, and three days to take a little pause from hockey.
"It's good to spend time with some family and friends, and recharge," Staal said. "And get excited on the 26th to get back to the rink."
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