Returning Blueshirts Lead Rangers to Win in Dallas

A pair of returning Rangers led the Blueshirts to a 2-0 win over the Stars in Dallas Thursday night.
Rick Nash scored the game-winning goal 7:08 into the third period and Henrik Lundqvist stopped all 27 shots he faced, as the Rangers opened a two-game road trip with a win.

With the Rangers down a man in the third period, Nash - who missed the last four games with a groin injury - picked off a Jamie Benn pass at the Rangers blueline and broke in alone and beat Antti Niemi glove side just inside the crossbar to break the scoreless tie.

"I knew pretty early," Nash said of his decision to shoot rather than make a move on Niemi. "Just from watching Chris Kreider on his breakaway. [I] saw [Niemi] was kind of cheating the deke and thought I could catch him with a quick shot and kind of catch him off guard."
It was Nash's 12th goal of the season, and the Rangers' fifth shorthanded goal of the campaign.
Mats Zuccarello would add a shorthanded goal with 1:04 remaining to ice the game.
Lundqvist's return to the lineup after a four-game absence did not begin as planned after he was blindsided behind the net by Cody Eakin 9:19 into the first period, leaving the goaltender helmetless and forcing him out of the game for 5:31 of action.
"I didn't see him coming at all," Lundqvist said. "When I went down, I think first you just check if everything is the way it should be. Neck, shoulder was a little sore. [Trainer Jim Ramsay] came out and told me you have to leave right away, so I got off."
Head coach Alain VIgneault said he hoped the NHL penalizes Eakin accordingly.
"The League better do something about that hit," he said. "It's everything you want to take away from the game: a hit to the head, a forward motion and it's a goaltender on top [of it]. If that happens in the playoffs and your goaltender has to go out of the net - they better do something about that and take care of business."
Lundqvist would return, though, and turned in one of the better performances of the season. After making just six saves in the first period, Lundqvist was peppered with 18 shots in the second period, including four saves late in the period with the Rangers on the penalty kill.
"Special teams was the difference again," Lundqvist said. "The way we killed a lot of penalties tonight. It won us the game tonight, and obviously the game winner was on our PK. It's so important to have confidence when you go down a man and the last couple games we've been doing a great job with reads and blocking shots and putting pressure on."

With the win, Lundqvist is 12-5-1 in his last 18 starts. It was the first time two goaltenders appeared in the same shutout in Rangers history.
After a week of answering questions about not starting, Lundqvist said he went into the game with a different mindset than before his weeklong absence.
"All I can say is I went out there with a lot of desperation in my approach," Lundqvist said. "I felt like it was important for me to just feel good. My game hasn't changed over a week but my mindset obviously I've changed a little bit because of everything that's been going on. It is a new experience for me, but I have to approach it like you go out there and you do everything you can to help the team try to win."
After a decade-plus of dominance, that type of performance Lundqvist turned in is not wasted on his teammates.
"I don't want to say we expect it from him but he's our best player and he's one of the best goalies in the world," Nash said. "He's been a leader on this team for 12, 13 years. He's the reason why this organization has had so much success. Not really surprise that he comes back with that effort."
But it was a bit different for Lundqvist, who is now two wins shy of tying Dominik Hasek for the most wins by a European-born goaltender in NHL history.
"I'm just happy the way I responded," Lundqvist said. "It's been a lot of thinking. It's important that you just go back to your basics. It's hard sometimes to stick to that when you're analyzing so much. I just want to go out there and try to help the team to win. That was my main focus tonight and I'm happy I did that."