Playoffs might be a week away but since we are pretty certain to be playing them (by my calculation, Columbus has the tiebreaker on goals for/against), why not start the thread now.
Keys for me to be successful, in no particular order
a) Make sure Kreider does not Kreider Price again. I would also want one of our bigs to get him good if he goes within 10 feet of Price.
b) Balanced scoring. Seems obvious but the last few games at least, we have had scoring from a number of lines, not just relying on Pacioretty and Radulov to score for us.
c) Price be the Price of October-December and mid Feb to now and for Lundquist to remember he is terrible against us.
d) Contain the Rangers speed like we did the last game we played them. They are faster than we are, and do score more. However, we have better D in my view albeit slower. Needless to say, we will be in tough if Weber and Benn are not healthy as I would prefer not to enter the playoffs with a pair of Davidson and Nesterov.
e) Some goals on the power play. The one aspect of the team that has not improved since Dauterive took over is the power play. We cannot be as bad as we have been or else the Rangers might take liberties. Even if we go at 18%, that should be enough.
f) Use our increased size from the deadline to punish their forwards and their D. I would put a target on McDonagh and hit him every time he has the puck.
All in all, I figure we should win the series. We owe them for 2014.
Keys for me to be successful, in no particular order
a) Make sure Kreider does not Kreider Price again. I would also want one of our bigs to get him good if he goes within 10 feet of Price.
b) Balanced scoring. Seems obvious but the last few games at least, we have had scoring from a number of lines, not just relying on Pacioretty and Radulov to score for us.
c) Price be the Price of October-December and mid Feb to now and for Lundquist to remember he is terrible against us.
d) Contain the Rangers speed like we did the last game we played them. They are faster than we are, and do score more. However, we have better D in my view albeit slower. Needless to say, we will be in tough if Weber and Benn are not healthy as I would prefer not to enter the playoffs with a pair of Davidson and Nesterov.
e) Some goals on the power play. The one aspect of the team that has not improved since Dauterive took over is the power play. We cannot be as bad as we have been or else the Rangers might take liberties. Even if we go at 18%, that should be enough.
f) Use our increased size from the deadline to punish their forwards and their D. I would put a target on McDonagh and hit him every time he has the puck.
All in all, I figure we should win the series. We owe them for 2014.