Vincent Trocheck scored twice in 95 seconds early in the second period, and the New York Rangers stopped a four-game losing streak with a 5-2 victory over the visiting Los Angeles Kings on Sunday night.
The Rangers were without defenseman Ryan Lindgren (upper body), who is day-to-day following a hit by Washington’s T.J. Oshie. They dressed Braden Schneider and Ryan Carpenter, but Schneider did not play and Carpenter took one shift due to roster management for salary cap reasons ahead of a possible trade for Chicago’s Patrick Kane.
New York was down to 15 skaters for the final 43-plus minutes after defenseman K’Andre Miller was given a match penalty for spitting on Los Angeles defenseman Drew Doughty during a scrum with 3:23 remaining in the first.
Alexis Lafreniere scored in the first period while Artemi Panarin and Mika Zibanejad tallied in the third for the Rangers, who scored seven goals during their losing streak. Zibanejad scored on a power play after appearing to injure his ankle blocking a shot late in the second.
New York goalie Igor Shesterkin was sharp in a 26-save performance after allowing 17 goals in his previous four games.
Viktor Arvidsson scored a power-play goal late in the second and Matt Roy tallied early in the third for Los Angeles, which fell to 8-3-2 in its past 13 games.
Los Angeles goalie Jonathan Quick was pulled after allowing three goals on seven shots. Pheonix Copley made 12 saves.
New York went ahead with six minutes remaining in the first when Lafreniere got a feed from Kaapo Kakko, and his shot from a sharp angle on the red line to the left of the net banked off Quick’s pads.
Shortly after the Rangers killed off Miller’s penalty, Trocheck’s shot from the middle of the slot deflected off Roy’s stick for a 2-0 lead. Trocheck then made it 3-0 with a shot from the middle of the slot that sailed over Quick, who was then pulled.
Los Angeles ended Shesterkin’s shutout bid with 1:48 remaining in the second when Arvidsson batted a loose puck out of midair, and Roy made it a 3-2 by finishing off a two-on-one with Phillip Danault 87 seconds into the third.
Panarin made it 4-2 less than a minute after Roy scored by putting his own rebound past Copley, and Zibanejad gave New York a 5-2 lead with 14:34 remaining.
–Field Level Media
