Photo: The Canadian Press, Jeff McIntosh
Ryan McDonagh took advantage of a big bounce off the end boards and buried the overtime winner into a wide-open Flames net to give the New York Rangers a 3-2 win over the Calgary Flames tonight.
McDonagh was in the right place at the right time and was the recipient of a Devon Brandon Dubinsky point shot that sailed wide of the Flames net, bounced off the end boards and right onto his stick with about a second to play in overtime. He made no mistake and fired the game-winner into the net.
It was a tough loss for the Flames who played hard, but couldn’t beat Rangers goalie Henrik Lundqvist often enough.
The New York Rangers got on the board first with a powerplay goal from Marian Gaborik less than 5 minutes into the game. But the Flames answered back less than a minute later when Jarome Iginla tapped in a sweet pass from Alex Tanguay for his 2nd goal of the season.
Former Flames tough guy, Brandon Prust, put the Rangers in front again with a short-handed goal just over halfway through the first period. Prust took advantage of a sloppy play by the Flames and found himself wide open in front of Calgary goalie Henrik Karlsson. He took a pass from Brian Boyle and roofed it over Karlsson to regain the lead.
After a somewhat questionable penalty call (the refs kinda sucked tonight), the Flames capitalized with the man advantage to tie it again. After passing the puck back and forth a couple times, Iggy fed Gio from the side boards and he snapped a shot past Rangers goalie Henrik Lundqvist, who was screened by one of his own defenceman.
The big story of the 2nd and 3rd periods was the futility of the Flames’ powerplay. Calgary had 3 consecutive powerplays, but couldn’t muster a single shot on two of them in the 2nd period. On their final man-advantage of the 3rd period, with time winding down in the game, they only managed to get 2 shots on net and neither of them was a good scoring chance. In the end this would be the difference in a game that they could have won if their special teams were better.
The other story of the game was how chippy the game was at the beginning. The Flames and Rangers only play each other once per season, but it didn’t stop them from hitting, chirping and even fighting. Tim Jackman and Mike Rupp dropped the gloves in the first period and so did Corey Sarich and Mike Newbury a few minutes later.
The fans also got in on the action, booing rookie Tim Erixon every time he touched the puck. For those who don’t remember, Tim Erixon was drafted by the Flames in the first round of the 2009 entry draft but “couldn’t come to terms” with the Flames. We view that as a slight against our team and our city, yet we’re glad that Erixon sucks and ended up in New York where he will languish amongst the NHL throw-aways. Have a nice life, loser.
Greg is the founder of Red Mile Blog has been following the Flames through good times and bad since they arrived in Calgary in the early 80s. He has written hundreds of articles on the Flames since 2005 and considers himself an expert on hockey inconsistency and frustration. He shoots right and usually plays defence, but has been known to jump up in the rush. He is a 2-time CAHL men's league champion and knows the sweet taste of beer from a Cup.
