MONTREAL _ Two days after bemoaning their inability to win games away from home this season, the Rangers played another poor road game and lost, 5-2, Saturday night to the Canadiens and were swept on their two-game trip to Canada.
Canadiens captain Shea Weber, playing his second game after missing the first 24 of the season because of a knee injury, scored his first two goals of the season, and Artturi Lehkonen added two goals as the Canadiens handed the Rangers their eighth regulation loss _ and 10th loss overall _ in 13 road games this season (3-8-2). The Blueshirts, who return to the friendly confines of Madison Square Garden on Sunday against the high-flying Winnipeg Jets on Vic Hadfield Night, are 13-12-2 overall.
After the 3-0 loss in Ottawa on Thursday, several Rangers talked about how poorly the team has played on the road this season, and forward Chris Kreider said the team does not trust and rely enough on the structure of play coach David Quinn and his staff had put in place.
"You know, you're not going to have your 'A' game every night, but the things you need to rely on are the structure and the process of having success," Quinn said. I think we've gotten a little bit away from that over the last two road games (the 3-0 loss to Ottawa and a 4-0 loss to Philadelphia the day after Thanksgiving), in particular."
The Rangers certainly did not have their "A game" in this one. As in Ottawa, they fell behind early, when Weber's left point one-timer through traffic eluded Alexandar Georgiev (36 saves) for his first goal of the season at 3:53.
But after the Canadiens dominated the first half of the period, the Rangers, energized by some good work by their third and fourth lines, began to take control in the second half of the period, and they looked to be in good position heading into intermission � until defenseman Brady Skjei made a costly mistake that allowed Montreal to go up 2-0.
With the Rangers pressuring them in their own zone, the Canadiens managed to clear the puck as the final seconds of the period ticked off, and Tomas Tatar streaked up the right wing boards. Skjei was back in position, and came over to cut Tatar off. But his stick got tangled up in Tatar's skates and the Canadiens forward fell down. With a tripping penalty about to be called, Skjei stopped skating and turned to the linesman to protest the call. Play continued, Weber ended up with the puck, and scored on a breakaway with 6.4 seconds left in the period.
Lehkonen scored twice early in the second period put the Canadiens ahead 4-0, first beating Georgiev on a two-on-one wrist shot that so frustrated the goaltender that he destroyed his stick by slamming the post several times in frustration. Then, Neal Pionk made the decision to throw a backhand pass from behind the goal line in front of his own net and hit Lehkonen right on his stick tape. Lehkonen made no mistake, finishing at 5:29.
Quinn called timeout at that point, and did what he could to fire up his team. And the Rangers did get two back before the period was over, at least. First, Jimmy Vesey one-timed a pass from Brendan Smith at 8:10 for his ninth goal of the season, and then, on a power play, Ryan Strome deflected in a pass by Vesey for his third of the season, and second as a Ranger, at 14:11.
But the Rangers couldn't come back any further than that, and Tatar added his 11th of the season at 10:28 of the third to make it 5-2.
