The New York Rangers’ road problems kept flashing red Saturday night in Ottawa.
Fresh off a loss in Toronto, the Rangers stayed in Canada and ran into another early hole against the Senators, falling behind 2-0 in the first period before spending the rest of the night trying to dig out. New York entered the game just 1-4-1 away from MSG, and the start in Ottawa did nothing to quiet the concern around how they’re playing on the road.
Drake Batherson opened the scoring with his fifth goal of the season, and Tim Stutzle followed about a minute later with his eighth to put Ottawa in control early. The Rangers never really settled in during that opening stretch, and the Senators kept making them pay for lapses.
The second period only deepened the problem at first. New York got caught with some players on a long shift, and Batherson struck again just under two minutes into the frame, jamming in a loose puck past Dylan Garand for his second goal of the game.
When the Senators later had a man-advantage, they made a mistake, and Will Cuylle turned it into a short-handed goal off a strong feed from Noah Laba. But Ottawa answered right back as the power play expired, with the puck deflecting off Dylan Cozens past Garand for the Senators’ fourth goal.
That’s when the Rangers finally pushed back.
J.T. Miller pounced on a loose puck and buried it for his third goal of the season, and then Alexis Lafreniere cut the deficit to one late in the second with his ninth goal, coming during a four-on-four sequence. Suddenly, New York had life after looking buried earlier in the period.
That momentum carried into the third, where the Rangers spent the opening 10 minutes generating chance after chance and controlling play. They just couldn’t cash in. And when a team is already fighting its own mistakes, that kind of missed opportunity usually hurts.
Ottawa made sure it did. On a transition chance, Jake Sanderson scored his first goal of the season to restore a two-goal cushion at 5-3.
The Rangers answered again when Pavel Dorofeyev ripped home a shot off a pass from his new linemate Cuylle, trimming it to 5-4 and forcing New York to pull Garand for the extra attacker. That gamble didn’t pay off, as the Senators closed it out with an empty-net goal.
The final result left the Rangers with the same ugly road narrative. They’ve been sloppy away from home, and the mistakes are piling up fast enough to cost them games. The encouraging part is that the offense has been better on the road lately, but it hasn’t been nearly enough to cover the errors.
New York heads home next to face the struggling Los Angeles Kings, and Artemi Panarin will return for that one after the Rangers traded him away last season.
In Other News...
Senators Just Opened A Roster Decision Fans Should Watch
Kurtis MacDermid is back in the mix for the Senators after Ottawa placed the veteran winger on waivers, a sign he has moved past the upper-body injury that had kept him sidelined. The move opens a roster question for a team that has been managing the edges of its depth chart, especially with a player whose role has largely been as a fourth-line enforcer during his nine NHL seasons and 307 games.
What happens next matters for Ottawa because MacDermid is in the final year of his contract and sits in that familiar gray area between NHL depth and organizational flexibility. If he goes unclaimed, the Senators can free up cap room and likely keep him in the AHL, leaving the club with one more bit of maneuvering space as it sorts out the bottom of the roster. [Read more 🡒]
Senators Face A Bigger Test Than Beating The Rangers
The Senators got the result they needed against the Rangers, and they got it with a new face in net. Backup Jonas Johansson made his Ottawa debut and settled in well enough to help the club come away with a 7-4 win, a useful answer on a night when the offense did plenty of the heavy lifting.
The bigger concern now is what comes next on the road trip, where Ottawa may have to keep leaning on its depth in goal. Linus Ullmark remains on injured reserve and is expected to miss at least a couple of games, which turns a solid one-night performance into a more important test of how the Senators handle the stretch ahead. [Read more 🡒]
Senators Suddenly Face A Goalie Problem They Didnt Need
The Senators are heading into their upcoming road trip with an unexpected hole in goal after Linus Ullmark was placed on injured reserve because of a lower-body injury. Ottawa now has to make do without its starter for at least the near term, and the timing is less than ideal for a team that would rather be settling into its routine than adjusting on the fly.
Samuel Ersson and Jonas Johansson are the goaltenders expected to carry the load in Ullmarks absence, giving the Senators a very different look in net for the stretch ahead. There is some better news on the blue line, though, with captain Thomas Chabot expected to rejoin the club after dealing with an upper-body injury, a welcome boost as Ottawa tries to navigate the trip without letting the goalie situation become a larger issue. [Read more 🡒]