SNY.tv recapr takes a look at how the media reacted to the Rangers’ 0-3 series deficit vs. the Bruins.
In less than two minutes, recapr covers the media’s reaction to New York’s sports stories, pulling together multiple angles and viewpoints – from Twitter to text to talk radio – giving you the whole story in one place.
In 2010, the Flyers came back from being down 0-3 to beat the Bruins in a second round series.
Darroll Powe was a member of the Flyers on the team that came back against Boston and spoke today about that series.
Powe said “you go in everyday and focus at the game at hand. You can’t win four games tomorrow night. We need to focus on coming out strong, going shift by shift and chipping away. You win every shift and that is how you get back into the series.”
Powe added that things start to change when you win one and start to see your confidence build while the opposition starts to see their confidence wane.
Arron Asham was also on the 2010 Flyers.
According to a tweet from Katie Strang, Ryane Clowe is on the ice at Rangers practice.
Clowe hasn’t played since game six against the Capitals when he took a hit from Jason Chimera.
Clowe returned to the Rangers lineup in game five against the Capitals after missing the early part of the series with an undisclosed injury.
Strang notes that today’s practice is an optional and that Carl Hagelin is on the ice but Anton Stralman and Chris Kreider are not.
Andrew Gross notes that Darroll Powe, Marc Staal, Brad Richards, Ryan Callahan, Mats Zuccarello and Ryan McDonagh are on the ice at the optional skate.
Yesterday, while on TSN Radio, Darren Dreger talked about how he thinks John Tortorella could lose his job if the Rangers go out quickly to the Boston Bruins.
On TSN Radio in Montreal this morning, Bob McKenzie said “I think more people are swinging around to the idea that he doesn’t have the better team in this series, as unpopular as Torts may be because of how he carries himself for what he says, you do get that feeling when you watch the Rangers. But you do get the people who think that he has them all leashed up and blocking shots and collapsing down low so they don’t ever go and play. There was a transformation with the Rangers over the last number of years and Tortorella was a big part of that in getting them to play hard and maximizing what they do have. They went out and made some moves in the offseason. It hasn’t paid dividends yet. Don’t be fooled by the statistics, Rick Nash has had good games in the playoffs but they aren’t a team that scores easily and often and there must be a diminishing return on having to play that style game after game. It has to be mentally fatiguing to know that you have to go into every game blocking more shots, hitting more guys and do that consistently just to have a chance to win.”
When asked if this could be the end of Tortorella, McKenzie said “A lot of people will say yes and I wouldn’t necessarily rule it out because they may feel that, but they may also be very careful in terms of….if you think you have a valuable coach who is good and you are very careful about just throwing him away, I think they will give that some long-hard thought and it’s also finding someone better and who is the alternative and if you bring in another coach, what is his style and does he have the personnel to play that style. If not can you go out and make enough moves to make the next guy successful. It’s not as easy as, well you potentially get swept in the second round in a year where they thought they would go a lot deeper. You have to be careful not to make a move that would actually set your organization back because it’s an easy decision to pop the coach.”
Katie Strang said in a chat at ESPN.com that she believes strongly that Tortorella’s job is safe. She adds that he may be on a short leash next season and that his style of play may get some tweaking in the offseason.
Adam Rotter: There is a shelf life with John Tortorella, but I don’t think his time is up yet. He is too woven too much into the fabric of this team for him to be let go in a shortened season, where there was no training camp, Marc Staal has only played once since early March, Brad Richards regressed and the team won a round in the playoffs. His players haven’t quit on him and have fully, for better or worse, bought into everything he is selling.
You look at where the Rangers are right with the roster they have constructed and the biggest thing with firing Tortorella, as McKenzie notes, is finding a coach capable of doing a better job. If Tortorella was to be fired, he would immediately become the best coach on the open market and one of the only with a Stanley Cup to his name. To me, it makes sense to give Tortorella next season, albeit with probably a moderate to short leash, and then make a change when half the roster has their contracts end, the cap goes up, and you can start constructing a team that suits the next coach.
In the playoffs so far, Henrik Lundqvist has a record of 4 and 6 and is averaging just over 2 goals against per game, while stopping 93% of the shots taken on him.
Lundqvist has faced more shot attempts in the playoffs, 340, and stopped more shots, 318, than any other goalie in the playoffs.
Of the eight goals that Lundqvist had scored on him in games one and two, Pierre McGuire said on the radio yesterday that he was only in a real position to stop three of them.
Last night, the Bruins out-shot the Rangers 34-24 and Lundqvist stopped 32 of 34 shots.
Every Boston Bruin talked to on the MSG Post Game show, Claude Julien, Johnny Boychuk, Danny Paille, Shawn Thornton and Tuuka Rask all mentioned how well Lundqvist played last night and Thornton and Paille noted that the only ways Lundqvist was going to be beaten was on the exact type of goals that they scored.
John Tortorella said on MSG last night that Lundqvist was outstanding and made many big saves while under pressure.
Lundqvist told the NY Times that the team just didn’t get the bounces lat night while the Bruins did.
At Pat Leonard notes in the Daily News, Lundqvist stops pretty much everything that he sees but he didn’t have that chance on the game winner, “That was the problem. I didn’t see it.”
Adam Rotter: The Rangers should never lose when Henrik Lundqvist plays this well, especially in the playoffs and even more so in a game that can change the direction of a series. This game could have been 3-0 Boston after 1 and I don’t know how much blame Lundqvist would have received with all the breakdowns in front of him. As has been the story often times in his career, he picked up the players in front of him and gave them a chance to win. They didn’t come close to doing the same for their goalie.
With last night’s loss to the Bruins, the Rangers ended a 99 game streak of not losing in regulation when taking a lead into the third period.
The Rangers were 16-0-0 in the regular season when leading after two periods.
In the NY Post, when describing this streak, Mark Cannizaro writes that Lundqvist with a lead is like “Mariano Rivera with pads and a mask.”
On MSG, John Tortorella was asked about how the team will approach being on the verge of elimination on Thursday night.
Tortorella said, “we will meet tomorrow. Practice and try to win a game. It’s a very tough situation, but I have full faith in our athletes. They will be ready to play, try to win one and see where you go from there.”
