NHL

Rangers dominate Hurricanes for impressive Game 4 win to even series

Underdogs or not, the Rangers have reinserted themselves into this second-round series against the Hurricanes in convincing fashion.

After dropping the first two games of Round 2 on the road, the Rangers effectively protected home ice and evened the series at two-all with a win in Game 3 and then an inspiring 4-1 victory over the Hurricanes in Game 4 Tuesday night at Madison Square Garden to send this matchup back to Raleigh, N.C., looking a lot different than it did at the start.

In New York, the Rangers have stifled Carolina’s usually cohesive team game. They have worked for the right balance of scoring and a defensively sound structure. And as a result, the Rangers have quickly turned this into a competitive series.

Oh, and the Hurricanes are now 0-5 on the road this postseason.

“It’s huge to get the series back to even,” said Ryan Lindgren, who recorded his first career multi-point playoff game with two assists in the win. “Even the first two games in Carolina, we played good hockey. We’ve been a confident group all year. We’ve played the hockey we wanted to play in Carolina, even though we didn’t get the score we wanted.

Hurricanes center Steven Lorentz fights Rangers defenseman Jacob Trouba. Corey Sipkin

“But I think that just speaks to our team. We were down, but we’re never out.”

Jacob Trouba got the Rangers going when he ran through Canes’ fourth-liner Maxi Domi in the first period, presumably as payback for what head coach Gerard Gallant called a cheap shot on Lindgren after the final whistle in Game 3.

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Domi’s linemate Steven Lorentz stepped in to fight Trouba, who got in his fair share of punches and got the Rangers a power play as Lorentz was hit with five minutes for fighting, a 10-minute misconduct and an instigator infraction.

Andrew Copp then teed up Frank Vatrano with a cross-zone pass for the 1-0 lead at 13:31 of the first.

“It was a big hit,” said Copp, who earned another assist just over two minutes later on Adam Fox’s 2-0 score before chipping in a goal in the third to cap the scoring. “Obviously, kind of changes the course of the game a little bit with them taking that penalty and us capitalizing.”

The Rangers celebrate a goal during their Game 4 win over the Hurricanes to even the series. Corey Sipkin
Andrew Copp Corey Sipkin

Carolina had its stretches, the long and suffocating ones where it pins its opponents in the offensive zone and maintains possession for what feels like minutes at a time. Teuvo Teravainen avoided the shutout with a goal early on in the third period.

But the Rangers would not — and have not — let the Canes get to their game.

Rangers goalie Igor Shesterkin deserves a bulk of the credit. His 43 saves in Game 3 and 30 stops in Game 4 speak for themselves. But this was arguably the Rangers’ most complete game of the playoffs.

The Rangers could’ve floundered when they fell behind two games to none against the mighty Hurricanes. The fact they felt like they played well enough to win in both contests could’ve been deflating. Instead, they built on it and leveled the playing field.

“I think we’re confident,” Copp said. “Staying even-keeled was important after the two games in Carolina, where both games are kind of right there and maybe we didn’t produce as much offensively, but we did a lot of good things. Now, we get two games where we win, we play well, we only give up two goals total and now the [talk is reversed] on them now.

“We just got to block all that out and just stay with our game and now that guys are feeling a little bit better about themselves, we got to ride this momentum into Carolina.”