Filppula scores late, Lightning end Rangers’ winning streak

The NY Rangers head to the Sunshine State to face the Tampa Bay Lightning.

And this one was just as hard to take. Derek Stepan, Ryan McDonaugh and Derick Brassard also sored for NY who received 23 saves from Antti Raanta who is 4-0 on the year. It was nearly deja vu from the Florida game the other night; they get a power play with less than two minutes left but obviously the opposite outcome… “That’s what stings the most”.

The Lightning defeated the NY Rangers 2-1 and in the process snapped the Rangers 9-game winning streak.

Dominic Moore scored for the Rangers, who fell one short of matching the franchise record of 10 straight wins accomplished in 1939-40 and 1972-73.

Moore tied it at 1 from in-close at 13:43 of the third after Tampa Bay defenseman Anton Stralman couldn’t control a pass from Bishop behind the net. “I thought, the way we played, we deserved to win”. “It’s a lesson that we have to continue to play all 60 minutes and execute with the puck. We had the puck a lot but they were doing their five-men low thing”.

Ben Bishop, who stopped 20 shots for the injury-plagued and struggling Lightning (9-9-3), including Chris Kreider’s penalty shot at 3:51 of the third period, is 9-0-0 against the Rangers lifetime in the regular season.

He, of course, beat the Rangers, 2-0, in both Game 5 and Game 7 of the conference final at Madison Square Garden, denying the Rangers a repeat trip to the Stanley Cup Final after a five-game loss to the Kings in 2014. If the Rangers win on Thursday it will be their 10th consecutive win that will tie a club record. “We’re on a one-game performance and analyze the game and move onto the next mentality, and that hasn’t changed”. “We had to get the break”. San Jose won it with 1:15 left in the extra fram when Melker Karlsson scored on a 2-on-1 rush off a pass from Joonas Donskoi. 3, Tampa Bay, Filppula 2 (Brown), 18:55 (sh).

With the teams skating four-on-four in the first period, Killorn, who scored the victor in the third period of Game 7 of the Eastern Conference finals, beat Lundqvist at 14:47 after a turnover by Keith Yandle.

Alex Killorn gave the Bolts a 1-0 lead on a nice shot from right under the hashmarks that snuck by Rangers’ goalie Henrik Lundqvist.

“There’s no doubt that he’s on top of his game and he’s finding a way to make a difference in games”, coach Alain Vigneault said.

It wasn’t pretty but the Tampa Bay Lightning will take it. That’s all they can do at this point of the season.

You wouldn’t want to call it a makeshift lineup, but with Tyler Johnson, Ryan Callahan, Ondrej Palat, Cedric Paquette, and Jonathan Drouin all out with injuries and Mike Blunden, Jonathan Marchesault, Luke Witkowski and Joel Vermin (making his National Hockey League debut) all called up to fill in, there was definitely a (Syracuse) Crunch to the Tampa Bay Lightning roster.

The Rangers had not lost since a 3-2 shootout defeat at Philadelphia on October 24.