| 2/27/03 |
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| Boston Bruins |
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| New York Rangers |
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| Goalie | Ice Time | Grade | Comments |
| Mike Dunham #30, G |
A- | Typically unappreciated Dunham performance. Highlight reel saves? No. Solid, true #1 goalie saves? Hell yeah. And a ton of them. Two big time saves near the end of the 1st, one on Girard from point blank and another wide open slapper turned aside, Murray from the right circle. A few big ones in the 3rd, too. The Dude was on top of his game tonight, reading the plays a step ahead of the shooters and being in position a second ahead. He wasn't out of position all night. 38 shots, 37 saves. Mike Dunham is like that girlfriend you used to have. Not the greatest looking girl, not the most exciting, but you go through five other girlfriends afterwards and wish any of them had the same combination of being strong in all areas but spectacular in none rather than these new floozies who are strong in one area but weak in the rest. | |
| Dan Blackburn #31, G |
(DNP) | ||
| Defenseman | Ice Time | Grade | Comments |
| Brian Leetch #2, LD |
26:29 | B | Beauty of a pass to Bure for the Rangers third. Through the legs, right on the tape. Pretty good game otherwise, though not a huge factor. |
| Tom Poti #3, RD |
17:21 | B | I'll be the first one to admit, Tom Poti ain't no Ulf Samuelsson. But his reputation as a wuss is a little unfair, I think. Tom Tom played a very good defensive game tonight, taking a WICKED blast off the ankle on a 1st period PK block, and threw more hits than any other d-man short of Kaspar. Didn't play the 3rd because of the ankle, I think. A good defensive game. |
| Vladimir Malakhov #23, LD |
17:43 | F | Malakhov played okay. C+ to B level. The "F" is for his idiotic blunder late in the Devils game, the worst blunder any Ranger has made all season. And if I do any more report cards this season, the "F" will remain. It was that bad. |
| Boris Mironov #29, RD |
19:21 | C | Took two minors in the 1st period alone! Both were certainly touchy calls, but in a game like this it's better to err on the side of caution. |
| Darius Kasparaitis #6, LD |
16:43 | C+ | Absolutely UNCONSCIONABLE penalty in the 1st period, Rangers already down a man. On a PK clear Kaspar gets pegged, so the next time back into the Rangers zone Kaspar x-checks the offending Bruin square in the face, instant 1:15 two man PP for Boston. He was fine, even good besides that blunder, but MAN, that could've been a killer. |
| Cory Cross #4, RD |
18:29 | B | I really like Cory Cross. Quick, point out some glaring mistakes Cross has made in his 22 games with the Rangers! See, he hasn't. He's slow, he's tall, lanky and awkward, can't score, can't really pass, but he makes few mistakes. He's also big enough to keep the larger opponents out of his crease. He's no Rod Langway, but as a 5th/6th defenseman the Rangers couldn't do much better. You think I'm nuts? +2, 4 SOG, 18:29 TOI. That's a very good game. |
| Foreward | Ice Time | Grade | Comments |
| Eric Lindros #88, C |
17:50 | B | Didn't score, didn't even get many good chances, but I thought he played a good hard game. Several big hits, was a bull around the net and on the faceoffs... he just doesn't have the touch this season. Who knows why, but the effort was there. |
| Matthew Barnaby #36, LW |
11:58 | B | Had some shifts here and there, but one of the lesser contributers on the night. |
| Alexei Kovalev #27, RW |
18:02 | B+ | That's how dangerous this team is with this lineup when healthy. Kovalev played an okay game before his goal - neither particularly good or bad - but one flash of talent early in the 3rd period when no one was expecting it and a game in the balance is now over. A gorgeous goal, too. Faked the defenseman to look outside, moved inside and hit a perfect backhander into the top left corner. |
| Petr Nedved #93, C |
20:30 | B | Nedved made the crucial Petrovicky SH goal by himself by being relentless on the forecheck, stealing the puck not once but twice on the same shift, finally feeding Petro in the slot for the wobbly deflection. He wasn't terribly involved in the play most of the game, but he did play hard, and play mistake-free, which is a good game. |
| Ronald Petrovicky #38, LW |
11:36 | A- | There's no way in sweet hell he meant to put the deflection where it went - a slowww floater over the far shoulder of Hackett - but give Petro credit for getting the deflection on net in the first place, not to mention drawing a 5 minute PP earlier in the 1st. Petro played one of his best games all season, and certainly his best in about 3 months. Hit everything that moved, about four great ones. Drew penalties. Even scored a goal. Played about as best as he could tonight. |
| Pavel Bure #9, RW |
18:18 | B+ | His goal late in the 2nd to make it 3-1 Rangers was about as easy as it gets. Bure held his stick out on the right post as a target and Leetch hit it with a laser pass, but Bure played well otherwise. His backchecking was tireless. You won't mistake him for Jan Erixon, . |
| Bobby Holik #16, C |
17:20 | B+ | Bobby Holik's mouth. Quite a big mouth. I like his mouth. So do most Ranger fans. He says what needs to be said, where this team FOR-EVER has just been spouting cliches about how they need to play harder and blah blah blah. And Holik played a good game. Matched against Thornton and keeping one of the three best players in the NHL circa 2003 off the scoreboard is no small feat. HOWEVER. 1st period, Rangers 3-on-3 coming into the zone, Holik tries a Dvorakian cross ice pass across the blue line, intercepted, Boston scoring chance. For all Bobby talks about how this team stupidly doesn't learn it's lessons, what the hell was that?? I'm not saying the emperor wears no clothes, but he does strut around in a speedo from time to time. |
| Jamie Lundmark #26, LW |
12:31 | B- | Anyone else catch in the 3rd period when Lundmark was high sticked, yet the trainer on the bench was lifting up the back of Lundmark's jersey with an aerosol can (spray-freeze?) in his hand? Maybe it was the 12 pack I drank during the game playing tricks on my eyes. Lundmark was okay tonight, nothing very noticable. |
| Radek Dvorak #20, RW |
13:56 | B- | Same with Lundmark as with Dvorak. Didn't play bad but wasn't a big factor in the game. |
| Mark Messier #11, C |
17:11 | B+ | Missed a nice scoring
chance earlier on in the 1st - had an open wing, just half-assed the
shot. And then... let me take you back to 1993...
Schindler's List and Jurassic Park (I said Park, not Mark) were the big movies of the year. Some big songs of 1993 were the putrid "Whoomp! (There It Is)" by Tag Team, "Cryin'" by Aerosmith and "Hip Hop Hooray" by Naughty By Nature. That was also approximately the last time I saw Messier make a play like he did late in the 2nd period, and as IMPORTANT a play as he did. Quick poke check on Berard on the PK to steal it from him, went in alone on the breakaway and the patience. Oh brother, the patience, even though it was a pretty quick play. Just drifted in like a cat playing with a mouse, letting Hackett move first while Messier went backhand and up top on his THIRD move in close. Looked effortless on Messier's part. His game otherwise was less than spectacular, but that was a classic - and most importantly - very important Messier play that took 10 years off the clock. |
| Dan Lacouture #39, LW |
9:30 | B | Noticable shift in the 1st fighting through a pin along the high boards in the offensive zone. Had little effect on the game overall, but he's a very solid 4th liner and put in a good 4th line kinda game. |
| Sandy McCarthy #10, RW |
7:16 | C+ | In the words of Lisa Simpson, "Meh. M-E-H, meh". |
| COACHING STAFF: | B+ | He DID match Holik against Thornton, which is all you can ask for. How important was that matchup? Witness an early 2nd period shift where Thornton's line was able to come out against Nedved's and they held the puck in the zone for about a full minute. In total, Thornton had one shot and a -1. Good job. Sather also switched up the lines in the 2nd and 3rd when the Rangers weren't going well. And I agree with most of the criticism against him, but lemme tell ya, in that press conference after a mostly dominant 4-1 win, Sather chewing on the gum like a wiseass 16 year old... at least this team has an attitude right now. Outside of early last season, they haven't had an attitude for a long, long time. | |
| 1st PERIOD: | B+ | A period almost entirely played on the special teams. Rangers had 7 minutes of power plays, Bruins 6 minutes. Two crucial kills/wasted opportunities for both teams - Rangers blank on a 5 minute PP and the Bruins equally void on a 5-on-3 PP for about a minute fifteen. What little there was of even strength the Rangers had a solid edge as most of the good chances were theirs, and they outshot the B's by a whopping 18-9. | |
| 2nd PERIOD: | ? | Boston clearly outplayed the Rangers this period yet the Rangers had the scoring advantage 2-1. One of those periods you thank the Hockey Gods for granting you. | |
| 3rd PERIOD: | B | Boston looked ready to make a run with the score at 3-1, owning the first few minutes of the period, but Kovalev does a little shake 'n bake and Boston is deflated; 4-1, Rangers win. Rest of the period was the teams just playing out the clock. | |
| OVERALL: | A- | First of all...
SHUT UP! I can hear you now, fellow Ranger fan. We didn't do this right, didn't do that right, blah blah whine blah! This guy needs to go, we still have this problem, that problem, we have no chance at the playoffs, no chemistry, poo poo-pedoo! Gimme a break, huh? This was one game. One game they had to win. Easily the biggest game the Rangers have played since a late season March 11th game against Montreal last season, which the Rangers won 2-1 and kept them in 8th place ahead of the Habs by a few points, only to collapse out of the race with seven losses in the following eight games. All flaws can't be fixed in one game. Matter of fact, all flaws will NEVER be fixed. Did you see the Dallas/Boston game on Tuesday night? Dallas, a Dolemite of a team in a league of Mr. Ferleys, crumbled with a two goal lead in the 3rd period to let Boston tie the game 4-4. The Dallas Stars, a team we dream ours could be like. My inebriated point is, the Rangers had a MUST WIN game tonight. They won by a dominating 4-1, and outplayed the Bruins to do it. Doesn't mean they'll make the playoffs, doesn't mean their problems are "fixed". They won, won good, and had a game you could be proud of. Take it for what it is - a big win in a big spot, and spare me your total rebuilding/restructuring plans for a few days, huh? Thanks. |
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| Scratches: | Ted Donato (healthy) Janne Laukkanen (healthy) Sylvain Lefevbre (broken finger - IR) Dale Purinton (healthy) |
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| created by: | Pete Rocha, © 2003. procha@optonline.net | ||
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