NEW YORK _ The twists and turns of an NHL playoff series lend themselves to corresponding fits of hysteria and euphoria.
That, of course, is outside of a team's dressing room. Inside, there is no other focus than that night's game.
And, in the Rangers' case, the response.
On that front, the Rangers fell short in Sunday night's Game 3 at Madison Square Garden, not playing with enough desperation until the final minutes and losing 3-1 to the Canadiens on two power-play goals and Alexander Radulov's one-handed dagger with 4:25 left in regulation. They trail this first-round series, 2-1, after a late-game turn of events two nights prior at Montreal.
Now, they must respond in Tuesday night's Game 4 at The Garden or face the prospect of a second straight first-round exit after the eventual Stanley Cup-champion Penguins railroaded them in five games last season.
Even still, The Rangers are statistically in trouble. Per whowins.com, NHL teams that have taken a 2-1 lead in a best-of-seven series over the course of the league's history have gone on to win the series 70 percent of the time.
The Rangers were 17.3 seconds away from returning to the Garden with a 2-0 series lead. But Tomas Plekanec sent Game 2 into overtime and Radulov's goal at 18:34 of overtime gave the Canadiens a 4-3 win on Friday night at Bell Centre.
"As soon as the game is over you try to move on," said Rangers goalie Henrik Lundqvist, who followed his career playoff-high 54 saves from Game 2 with 26 in Game 3 as he tied Dominik Hasek and Tom Barrasso for 10th place on the NHL's all-time playoff appearances list with 119. "You do a quick analysis of the game, good and bad, and then it's time to think about today.
"It's to four (wins)," Lundqvist added. "You move on."
The Rangers, true playoff veterans as they were in their NHL-leading 84th postseason game since the start of the 2012 playoffs, were not shaken by their Game 2 loss.
But they could never shake off the Canadiens on Sunday night.
Make that, they could never establish enough offensive zone play to rattle the Canadiens or traffic to bother Carey Price (20 saves). Only Brady Skjei's one-timer at 17:04 of the third period, with Lundqvist off for an extra skater, kept Price from a shutout.
Ironically enough, an offensive zone infraction _ J.T. Miller clasped his hand on the puck while taking a faceoff in the Canadiens' zone at 16:05 of the second period _ finally led to the game's first goal. Tomas Plekanec beat Derek Stepan on a draw in the Rangers' zone and Brendan Gallagher, who continues to pester the Rangers with his play and pushing, fed an open Artturi Lehkonen in the slot for a one-timer at 17:37.
So now, not only does the question become the Rangers' response in Game 4, but whether they can respond at home.
The Rangers were a pedestrian 21-16-4 at the Garden in the regular season, closing with a 2-5-3 skid. A 3-2 shootout loss to the Canadiens on Feb. 21 started an 0-5-3 slump that lasted until March 31.
This is how the playoffs are. Everything is magnified. Too much can be made of every detail.
"I like the way we've been playing," Rangers coach Alain Vigneault said before Game 3. "I like the fact that we've been able to generate some pretty good looks. It might have slipped away from us the last game. But if we get it done with 17 seconds left, everybody is saying we played a textbook period. We've turned the page. We're focused in the moment."
Still, Vigneault engaged in some pregame gamesmanship as the lines the Rangers showed in warmups were far different than the ones used in the first two periods, which were actually the ones the Rangers used in Montreal.
By the third period, though, Vigneault dropped Mika Zibanejad from centering Mats Zuccarello and Jimmy Vesey to playing between fourth-line wings Michael Grabner and Tanner Glass. Jesper Fast was elevated to Derek Stepan's right wing along with Chris Kreider while Kevin Hayes went in between Rick Nash and Zuccarello and Oscar Lindberg centered Vesey and Miller.
But the key moment of the third period _ the key moment of the game, really _ came at 7:42 on Shea Weber's one-timer from the left circle to make it 2-0 with 25 seconds remaining on the four-minute, double-minor Zuccarello drew for high-sticking Andrei Markov at the Canadiens' crease.
The Rangers' immediate response in the first period was far from overwhelming despite two power plays _ they were 0 for 3 in the game. The Canadiens carried the play early, holding an 8-3 shot advantage at 11:26 after Lundqvist had to make successive, close-range saves on Max Pacioretty's redirection, a similar opportunity for Gallagher on the next rush and then a pad save on Paul Byron from the slot. Dwight King followed all that by hitting the crossbar for the Canadiens.
The Canadiens were the team playing at the crease and establishing a forecheck while the Rangers, too often, settled for shots from the outside.
"The good thing is we have to play every other day so you don't have a lot of time to sit around and think about it," Miller said.
