Rangers started the weekend with back to back games with Division rivals.
Saturday’s matinee contest started with Sidney Crosby and the Pittsburgh Penguins. Jonathan Quick guarded the twine for the Rangers on Saturday and was tested early in the first period at 2:32 in, when defenseman John Ludvig received a pass from Jeff Carter and blasted a shot from the point to beat Quick high on the glove side.
Rangers answered back with a goal each from Kaapo Kakko and Adam Fox to take the lead 2-1. The Pens and Rangers exchanged goals from Bryan Rust (Pens) and Artemi Panarin (NYR) to end the first period with the Rangers up 3-2.
Pittsburgh started the second period with a goal to knot it up at 3 from Center, Lars Eller. Rangers followed up with 2 goals from forwards Artemi Panarin his second of the game and Mika Zibanejad 65 seconds apart. Ranger started the 3rd period up 5-3 and extended that lead with a goal from defenseman K’Andrea Miller followed by Pittsburghs, Valtteri Puustinen cutting the Ranger lead to 2 goals and Chris Kreider ended the contest with an even strength goal at 19:42 of the 3rd period to sure up the win for the Blueshirts.
Rangers take the first of back to back weekend games 7-4 to defeat the Penguins in Pittsburgh at PPG Paints Arena.
Sundays 1:00pm matinee against the Stadium Series/division rival NY Islanders started with Igor “Shesty” Shesterkin guarding the pipes for the Rangers and one of his good friends at the other end of the ice for the Islanders in net, Ilya Sorokin. The Rangers again started the game by letting in a shorthanded goal when Brock Nelson fed a pass across the goal crease to find Bo Horvat who beat Shesterkin to take a 1-0 lead, the Isles held the lead going into the 2nd period.
The Rangers came out quick in the second period when Mika Zibanejad scored only :27 seconds in to tie up the game. Will Cuylle gave the Rangers the lead halfway thru the 2nd with an even strength goal at 10:14. Bo Horvat of the Islanders responded with his second goal of the day to tie up the game for the Islanders. Jonny Brodzinski would put the Rangers in the lead for the rest of the afternoon when K’Andrea Miller took a blast from the faceoff circle that was deflected by Brodzinski to beat Sorokin.
The Rangers would score 2 more unanswered goals in the 3rd period from Kaapo Kakko and Alexis LaFreniere to secure the sweep of the weekend. The Rangers defeat the Islander 5-2. The day was not without some possible bad news for the Rangers when defenseman Ryan Lindgren went down with what looked to be a leg injury and could not put weight on the leg and had to be helped off the ice. No updates on the extent of Lindgrens injury were reported as of Sunday evening.
The Rangers ended the weekend with 12 goals and their 5th win in 6 games. The Rangers also gave the Islanders their 4th straight loss. Sundays game against the Islanders was the last game of Matt Rempe’s 4 game suspension after elbowing NJ Devils defenseman Jonas Siegenthaler on March 11th. Rempe should return to the lineup when the Rangers face the Winnipeg Jets on Tuesday night at Madison Square Garden.