Rangers Rout Sabres 5-1 at MSG

Despite trades last month that shipped several key contributors out of New York, the Rangers showed on Saturday night there's still plenty of pop in this lineup.
The Blueshirts routed the Buffalo Sabres, 5-1, behind a pair of goals by Jimmy Vesey and defenseman Neal Pionk's first NHL tally. In total eight different Rangers had at least a point, with five players have two or more, led by Vesey's three.
"I don't know if it was our best effort," said Vesey, who equaled a career-high with the three points. "[Coach Alain Vigneault] said the first 11 minutes we gave up too much, and I'd say that's probably accurate. I thought we did a good job of limiting them. They have some skilled players. We didn't have as many shots but we made some nice plays and cashed in. It's a good win for us."

It feels like a distant memory after a lopsided win, but the Rangers were indeed on their heels at the start, with Buffalo getting 18 of the game's first 26 shots.
But the tide changed starting with Chris Kreider's goal at 16:29 of the first that extended his point streak to five, which was followed by Vesey's first 1:33 later that allowed the Rangers to leave the first up 2-0 despite being outshot 21-10.
The flood gates opened for New York in the second, starting with Pionk's conversion of a Vesey pass 3:59 into the middle frame. Vesey hit streaking Pionk breaking down the left wing before the defenseman slowed down and fired a one-timer at the bottom of the faceoff circle.

"It was a great feeling," said Pionk, who added an assist in the game and extended his point streak to seven. "I don't even believe it went in at first. Those guys give you a big hug and you go through the line and take a deep breath and kind of look up and say 'wow, I actually did it.' It's a great feeling."
Zibanejad kept the scoring going with a power play goal at 8:45. With the goal, Zibanejad established a new career-high with goals in five straight.

Vesey followed it up with another power play goal at 14:47 that gave the Rangers five goals on their last six shots on goaltenders Robin Lehner and Linus Ullmark.
"For sure not," Zibanejad said when asked about the flurry of goals on so few chances. "When you look at the goals, it's plays that are being made and some pretty passing plays and it's in the back of the net. Sometimes you get that momentum and pucks seem to go in."

Buffalo scored a power play goal by Sam Reinhart with 4:34 left in the third to end Alexandar Georgiev's bid for his first career shutout. Georgiev saw a lot of pucks - 44 shots in all - but wasn't tested with high-quality opportunities by the Sabres.
The game could have been different had it not been for Georgiev's strong first 20 minutes that allowed the Rangers to withstand the early push from Buffalo.
"The biggest thing for us was to get the lead in the first period and build on that," said Georgiev, who has 30 saves in seven of his eight NHL starts. "We scored great goals in the first period, played really good defense I think. Even if they had many shots, the guys were really battling to not let them have many good opportunities to score."
The Rangers scored on two of their three power plays and are eight for their last 17 over the last six games. Aside from the obvious of pucks going in, the key to success has been communication.
"We're talking a lot, trying to figure out the things we want to work on," said Zibanejad, who leads the club with 14 power play goals this season. "We're trying to have a five-on-five mentality to work hard on pucks and to be in the right spots."
The Rangers host the Capitals Monday night at Madison Square Garden.