GREENBURGH, N.Y. -- One overtime loss on the only 5-on-5 goal they've allowed in three games is certainly not enough to dampen the spirits of the New York Rangers nor make them start questioning what they're doing against the New Jersey Devils in the Eastern Conference First Round.
Rangers in 'good spot' ahead of Game 4 against Devils
Lead best-of-7 series, remain confident despite OT loss
"We're OK," coach Gerard Gallant said. "We're fine. We're in a good spot."
They lost 2-1 on Dougie Hamilton's goal at 11:36 of overtime in Game 3 at Madison Square Garden on Saturday, but the Rangers still lead the best-of-7 series 2-1 and really like how they've played against an opponent that beat them three times in the regular season and finished with five more wins and five more points in the standings.
They won Games 1 and 2 by identical 5-1 scores. Game 4 is at the Garden on Monday (7 p.m. ET; ESPN, SN360, TVAS2, MSG, MSGSN).
"We're playing really well," center Vincent Trocheck said. "We're playing really good defensively. We're getting our chances. It's rare that you see our power play go 0-for-5. I think if we play the same way I like our chances most nights."
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Trocheck said most nights because, as always, there are adjustments the Rangers feel they need to make to improve their chances of winning Game 4.
"We have to focus more on shooting the puck at the net and create the traffic there in front of their goalie," center Filip Chytil said.
You hear that all the time in the Stanley Cup Playoffs. Getting pucks and bodies to the net is always a point off emphasis, especially after a team loses.
In this case, Chytil wasn't talking about the actual shots on goal total. The Rangers had 36 in Game 3, including eight in overtime.
But they feel they were guilty of overpassing at times when the right play would have been to funnel the puck at the net in hopes of a rebound or deflection, especially against a rookie goalie in Akira Schmid, who was making his Stanley Cup Playoffs debut.
They should have peppered pucks at Schmid and made his life miserable, but they didn't.
"Sometimes you get too cute when you see that you scored 10 goals in the first two games," Chytil said. "Maybe you forget that it's a playoff game where you have to put in a lot of work to score goals. The first two games we scored 10 and maybe we thought it would be easier now, but it doesn't work that way. We tried to make some extra passes to the open guy but any time there is a good chance we have to put the puck there. When you shoot you can get a lot of rebounds. We have to go there and try to make it as hard for them as we can."
The Rangers blew out the Devils in Games 1 and 2 because they played straight ahead, got pucks and players to the net, and went 4-for-10 on the power play with forward Chris Kreider scoring every goal from about a foot away from goalie Vitek Vanecek on deflections and redirections.
"We didn't have enough rebounds [Saturday] night, jams around the net," Gallant said.
The Devils did a much better job taking Kreider away on the power play in Game 3, limiting the Rangers' ability to get shots or passes through. Mika Zibanejad and Artemi Panarin had opportunities with one-timers, but Schmid either stopped those or they missed the net.
"Mika had three or four Grade A chances but they took away the other option with Kreider in front of the net," Gallant said. "There weren't many shots going through from the point. Their penalty kill did a real good job but it's not like we didn't have chances because there were four or five. Panarin had one on the backdoor that he missed the net on the shortside. It was just a little bit of missed execution."
Which is nothing out of the ordinary in a playoff series, especially after a team wins the first two games going away like the Rangers did.
"We knew this would be a challenge," defenseman Jacob Trouba said.
The Rangers have accepted it and feel good about it, too.
Play a strong Game 4 on Monday and they could be one win away from conquering it.
"There are definitely areas that we want to be better at, stuff we did well in the first two games that we have to get back to," Zibanejad said. "Nothing major."
