In the final game of legendary New York broadcaster Sam Rosen’s 40-year career, the New York Rangers shut out the Tampa Bay Lightning, 4-0. Igor Shesterkin stopped 27 shots while Mika Zibanejad scored twice. Chris Kreider and Vincent Trocheck provdided the rest of the offense.
For the Lightning, there wasn’t much to play for tonight and outside of a few brief moments, they played like a team that was just trying to get to the final buzzer. Jonas Johansson was between the pipes and stopped 19 of 23 shots. The Lightning won the scoring chance battle, 24-19, but failed to find the back of the net against Shesterkin. Gage Goncalves, who led all Lightning skaters with 21:27 of ice time, had the best chance when he banged one off of the post in the first period.
Coach Cooper elected to play things safely as Goncalves, Yanni Gourde (19:24), Conor Geekie (18:22), and Zemgus Girgensons (18:18) were the ice time leaders among the forwards while Darren Raddysh was the only defender to crack 20 minutes. And his last few shifts were as a forward.
There was a somewhat scary moment for Bolts fans as Nikita Kucherov collided with J.J. Moser in the Lightning zone and was slightly shaken up for a few shifts. He eventually returned to the game and looked no worse for wear. The Lightning made it through the game unscathed, which was the number one goal for the night.
Now they can take a small break and then prepare for the fun part of the season – the playoffs.
The Goals
Vincent Trocheck (J.T. Miller) 1-0 Rangers
Chris Krieder (Mika Zibanejad, Will Cuylle) 2-0 Rangers
Mika Zibanejad (K’Andre Miler) 3-0 Rangers
Mika Zibanejad (Chris Kreider) 4-0 Rangers
The Charts
