What a difference 20 days make. It truly seems like a good amount of time has passed since fans wanted to ship Tortorella to Connecticut and wanted to drive Dubinsky to the airport on a plane bound for parts unknown. Since my last State of the Rangers column, the Rangers won 4 of 6 on the homestand and haven't lost since taking a bad shootout loss to the Senators on October 29. I really believe what started the Rangers incredible run were the events that followed the Rangers victory over San Jose on Halloween. As most of us know after the game, San Jose captain Joe Thornton called the Rangers the 'softest' team they played on their roadtrip. Word quickly got to Tortorella as he was asked about it during his post game press conference. You can be sure that Torts brought that back into the locker room with him.
Following that game, the Rangers went on a tear and haven't looked back. The Rangers have been winning games with offense (5-3 victory against the Habs), winning games with defense (3-0 victory against the Jets), and winning games through grinding and hard work when the puck just didn't seem to want to go in the net (2-1 SO victory against the Ducks.) When Torts does shuffle the lines, he does strike rich on occasion. Last year he paired the Prust-Boyle-Fedotenko line which was the best line for the Rangers heading down the stretch. This year its the Stepan-Anisimov-Gaborik line that has generated the most offense during the Rangers winning streak and for the Rangers to win the GAS line needs to consistently produce.
I want to quickly mention that its good to see Ryan Callahan continue to perform and play his game with the C on his chest now. It's a far cry from when guys like Drury, Jagr, and even someone like the beloved Brian Leetch seemingly crumble with the responsibility.
Speaking of contracts, the one guy that is seemingly really struggling with the weight of a new contract is Brian Boyle. Boyle, who has only 3 points so far in 15 games has really struggled and is not the same guy who surprised everyone coming out of camp last season on his way to a 21-14-35 season. Torts very recently has been putting him in the middle of Dubinsky and Callahan so hopefully the move can jumpstart him, however I'm not sure how long Boyle is going to keep Brad Richards on the third line.
Lastly, I want to mention Lundqvist. Hank has been letting up a few very un-Lundqvist like goals. It seems this year Lundqvist has let up a few soft goals that were low or very close to ice level. We were used to seeing Lundqvist when he first broke into the league consistently getting beat high glove when he did let pucks go past him. Now as a seasoned veteran in the NHL, Lundqvist has a MUCH improved glove hand and I do laugh a little inside every time I see a shooter come down the right wing and tries to beat Lundqvist high glove on his short side. But recently, like Ponikarovsky's goal last Friday is a shot that Lundqvist, un-screened should be able to handle. Nothing to full blown panic about but it's something to keep an eye on moving forward.
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