Igor Shesterkin leads the Rangers to their second consecutive shutout, defeating the rival Hurricanes.
Raleigh, North Carolina — Igor Shesterkin will take the Rangers as far as he wants them to go.
The Rangers’ 1-0 victory over the Hurricanes on Tuesday night served as the most recent reminder of this,
as the top-ranked Russian goalie recorded 28 saves to record his second straight shutout,
giving the team a six-point lead over Carolina in the Metropolitan Division rankings.
Coming in was a fiery Carolina squad. The Hurricanes had won 15-5 against their last three opponents.
Their offensive fell flat when they faced Shesterkin and the Rangers.
After leading the Blueshirts to their third straight victory, Shesterkin admitted,
“To be honest, today was my mom’s birthday.” “Therefore, I was unable to play poorly tonight.”
In the closing seconds of the first period, Shesterkin gutted out a goaltender duel with Pytor Kochetkov,
who gave up the Rangers’ lone goal on an Adam Fox shot that deflected in off former Rangers defenseman Brady Skjei.
Apart from that, Kochetkov posed an equal challenge to the Rangers, who were consistently denied the insurance goal.
particularly during the third quarter, which extended into the first several minutes of the last frame and turned into a track meet.
But the way Shesterkin has improved over the past month and a half should give the Rangers’ locker room confidence that he can make the difference in any game.
Giving the Vezina-winning goalie a little extra goal help will now be crucial.
Goaltending can make or break you, so listen to head coach Peter Laviolette.
“We’re lucky that the goaltending has given us a chance to win every night;
you see Shesty and Jonathan Quick in back-to-back games here on Monday night. However, tonight it affected everyone; Shesty was involved, for sure.
The Rangers’ season-long run of two wins, one 1-0, was fully deserved.
They not only fought with the same relentlessness that the Hurricanes do,
but they also made a savvy play in a close game where, in the last two minutes of regulation, Carolina substituted an extra skater for its goalkeeper.
During the first two periods, the sides exchanged blows, but the Rangers were the only ones to score.
The statistics were exactly reversed in the middle frame as the visitors limited the Hurricanes to five shots on goal as opposed to their eleven in the first period.
For a significant amount of the second period, the Rangers were confined to their zone,
and Shesterkin had to save his teammates multiple times as their fatigue from playing back-to-back games started to show.
The 28-year-old goalie twice robbed newly appointed Hurricane Evgeni Kuznetsov from close range as he recorded his third shutout of the year and improved to 28-13-2 overall.
The Blueshirts supporters in attendance could not stop yelling “IG-OR!” throughout PNC Arena.
Regarding low-scoring games, Shesterkin remarked,
“I think it’s easier for me.”
“You lose concentration and everyone else loses concentration too because you focus more on the puck than when it’s 4-0 or 5-0. Then you abandon your shit aim.
In this one, Shesterkin and the Rangers never wavered.
The Rangers can’t wait for the playoffs to arrive as long as their starting goaltender continues to play at this level.
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