The King Is Back On The Throne with 5-2 Win

#30 Henrik Lundqvist shut the Senators down for the home opener at Madison Square Garden.



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New York looked to be a different team in last night's loss, and they continued their strong play into tonight's game.

Most people are looking down on the blueshirts after their loss to the Pens last night, but I think losing to the defending champs by one goal is nothing to hang your head about.

The Rangers got their first goal of tonight's game in the 2nd period from #20 Vaclav Prospal. The goal was his first as a member of the Rangers, and his first of the season.

V. Prospal showed a lot of strength roofing the puck to gain the 1-0 lead. The assist to his first goal went to #18 Marc Staal, and #5 Daniel Girardi.

New York stayed relentless forcing another goal past the Ottawa goaltender with #17 Brandon Dubinsky assisted from #10 Marian Gaborik.



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Maybe this could be a preview of things to come for B. Dubinsky who failed to put up any sort of decent numbers last season until the playoffs.

Brandon is loaded with tremendous ability, and this looks to be the year where he develops into the hockey player he was scouted to be.

Ottawa was able to put one past goaltender Henrik Lundqvist on a slick pass from #19 Jason Spezza to #11 Daniel Alfredson who netted his first of the season.

After That New York tacked on another goal from the rookie Michael Del Zotto assisted from #23 Chris Drury, and # 21 Christopher Higgins to take a 3-1 lead into the 3rd period.

Brandon Dubinsky set up the next goal for New York after one of his shots came back for a rebound from Marian Gaborik for his 2nd goal in as many nights.

Marian showed a lot of quickness to the puck, and was able to put it through #33 Pascal Leclaire's legs to stretch the lead to three goals.

Brandon Dubinsky scored his 2nd goal of the game courtesy of Ottawa pulling their goalie with a minute left.

Brandon played really well tonight, and has a lot of chemistry playing with fellow line mate Marian Gaborik which should pay dividends throughout the year.

The main story of the game was the terrific effort out of "The King" Henrik Lundqvist who picked up his 143rd win in his short career.

The king had 33 saves while making 19 in the 2nd period alone to provide New York with another remarkable performance.

Anytime you have this man in between the pipes for your defensive zone you know that you are always given a chance to win.

The problem with the Rangers for so long as been their scoring game as a lot of big named players over the years didn't live up to the contracts they had signed.

Players such as Scott Gomez, and even Chris Drury couldn't put the puck in the net or muster up any type of offense.

There was a lot of pressure on those two players, and they were unable to come through when the team needed it last season.

Now Chris Drury can step back, and play his game behind newcomers Marian Gaborik, and Vaclav Prospal.

The team also has a lot of their younger players rising in the national hockey league as players to be noticed.

Defensemen Marc Staal has looked excellent the first two games, and is coming into his own at the age of 22.

As expected the referees were once again completely biased against the New York Rangers, by letting their players repeatedly take cheap shots, or be pulled down right in front of them.

The one thing they did that I liked was they let allowed a fight at the end of the game, even know the fight wouldn't have taken place if they made the right calls.

If you allow players to take cheap shots then that will always open up a game of fighting, so when people complain about the righting its the referees who need to maintain control out there.

One thing to take note of from this new Rangers team is that they don't miss the net 100 times a game, this team crashes the net hard, and creates a lot of offensive opportunities.

The Rangers will meet #30 Martin Brodeur, and their rivals the New Jersey Devils Monday night at 7:00 pm.

It would be nice to see #16 Sean Avery return for that game, as he always finds a way to get under the skin of M. Brodeur.

The Devils play a boring style of hockey behind Brodeur, but their games with New York are always exciting. There has never been a time that those two teams lacked intensity against one another.