Garand and Bjorkstrand Keep Rangers Perfect at the Garden in 5-2 Win Over Ducks
Dylan Garand made 29 saves and Oliver Bjorkstrand scored twice as New York improved to 6-0-0 at home — the Rangers' best start at Madison Square Garden since 1990-91.
The Rangers' home ice is starting to look like the safest points in hockey. New York beat the Anaheim Ducks 5-2 at Madison Square Garden on Monday to move to 6-0-0 at home, their best start there since 1990-91, when they opened with eight straight Garden wins, according to NHL.com's game recap. For context: last season the Rangers didn't win their sixth home game until January 26.
Built in the second
Sean Durzi opened the scoring just 1:18 in with a snap shot through traffic — the third straight home game New York has scored inside the opening two minutes, only the second time that's happened in franchise history. The second period broke the game open: J.T. Miller deflected an Adam Fox point shot on the power play, Gabe Perreault finished a tic-tac-toe sequence started by Durzi's forecheck, and Oliver Bjorkstrand intercepted a Beckett Sennecke pass and converted the breakaway for 4-0.
Bjorkstrand added his second early in the third off a Taylor Raddysh feed. "He can really shoot it," Rangers coach Mike Sullivan said. Anaheim's Nick Jensen — making his season debut — and A.J. Greer scored 36 seconds apart late to deny Dylan Garand the shutout, but the 29-save night extended a remarkable run: Garand has allowed two or fewer goals in five of six starts since inheriting the No. 1 job after Igor Shesterkin's season-ending lower-body injury on October 9.
A weary visitor
The Ducks (4-4-0) have now lost three straight after winning four of their first five, and this one came with an asterisk of circumstance: plane maintenance turned their trip east into a 15-hour travel day that ended at their hotel at 2:30 a.m. Monday. Coach Joel Quenneville wasn't reaching for excuses, though. "I thought our top guys weren't very good tonight," he said, calling the final score "flattering." Ville Husso stopped 25 shots in the loss, the first game of a four-game Anaheim road trip.