Rangers: Some things change, others stay the same

First things first. Despite the Ranger 2-1 OT loss tonight in Toronto, the Rangers did creep out of Canada with one point. While one would hope that back to back games vs Toronto should net at least one win, I am a glass half full kind of guy. We did get 2 points from two OT losses and I am just going to pretend that we won one and lost one in regulation.



Secondly, John Tortorella is not a miracle worker. A complete 180 degree turnaround from the Tom Renney era in only two days was highly improbable. The team has played with the same sense of urgency for the last five seasons, especially during the 12 previous games. This mentality will take a couple more games to break. Coming to acceptance with that fact will be key to Rangers fans out there. The light swtich cannot just be flipped on. This is not going to be done overnight.

With that said, let's take a look at all of the differences I noticed tonight while watching the game.

- The Rangers took 32 shots on goal. It's not necessarily the amount of shots that was different, but rather the types of shots. The Rangers were blasting from the point, something rarely seen in the Renney era. This lead to a bunch of longer rebounds and opportunities had the Rangers been crashing the net.

- WADE REDDEN SCORED! I forgot he was a Ranger. More importantly, IT WAS ON THE POWER PLAY. Once again this was blasted from the point, and there was traffic in front. It looked like an actual power play strategy was behind the play. Which leads us too...

- The Rangers actually looked like they had a power play strategy. Typically on the man advantage, the Rangers dump, chase, don't get to the puck in time, and 3 seconds later, Hank is stopping it behind the net and the Rangers are retreating. Today there was a distinct rhythm to the PP. Instead of over passing, and getting an unfortunate deflection like usual, there was a conscious effort to put the puck on net and see what happened.

- Lastly, Markus Naslund was in a fight! A) Who knew?!? B) I think this was a direct sign to Tortorella that he was willing to do things he isn't used to doing in order to win. I hope the rest of the team picks up on it. For those who are trying to recall the last Markus Naslund fight, it was back when he was a Penguin. Here is the YouTube video proof. Enjoy.