Igor Shesterkin made 40 saves, Alexis Lafreniere had a goal and an assist, and the New York Rangers won 2-1 against the Ottawa Senators at Madison Square Garden on Friday.
This was the second consecutive game where Shesterkin made 40+ saves, as he had 41 saves in a 5-3 loss to the Washington Capitals on Tuesday. It was the first time since February 2020 that he had back-to-back games with at least 40 saves during his rookie season. He made 21 saves in the first two periods and stopped 19 of 20 shots in the third.
“I’m running out of things to say; just spectacular,” said Rangers defenseman K’Andre Miller. “I mean, everybody is sitting there on the bench just praying that he somehow makes another one of those saves. He just keeps doing it. Obviously, we’d like to clean up our defense a little bit, but we love who we’ve got back there.”
Artemi Panarin scored his seventh goal of the season for the Rangers (7-2-1), who had lost two of their past three games.
“We know we can play better,” Lafreniere said. “‘Shesty’ was unreal again. He made some massive saves for us, and I don’t think we were that good defensively. We get two points, but we all know we can play better, for sure.”
Adam Gaudette scored for Ottawa, and Linus Ullmark made 16 saves for the Senators (5-5-0), who lost for the third time in four games. Ottawa outshot New York 41-18.
“I don’t really know what to say, their goalie played unbelievable,” said Senators forward Tim Stutzle. “We knew he was a great goalie and obviously we’ve got to find a way to get more behind him, but you’ve got to give him credit. He’s a great goalie and he kept them in the game. If you outshoot a team like that by 20 shots, you know you played a pretty good game.”
Panarin gave the Rangers a 1-0 lead at 3:03 of the first period. Lafreniere forced a turnover from Josh Norris in Ottawa’s defensive zone, and Panarin took the puck, using Travis Hamonic as a screen to get his wrist shot past Ullmark.
“Just coming back trying to strip him, I got a stick on it and went right to ‘Bread,'” Lafreniere said. “It was a nice shot. Every time he gets it in that area, in the slot, he’s so dangerous. That was a good goal by him.”
Shesterkin kept the Rangers ahead with a blocker save on Norris at 7:56 of the first period and also stopped Claude Giroux with his glove on a point-blank shot from the left circle at 17:10 of the second period. These were two of his 21 saves in the first 40 minutes.
“First period, I like the way we came out,” said Ottawa coach Travis Green. “They got the quick goal, but I like that it didn’t faze us. I thought we got better as the game went on. Loved our second and I thought we left it out there in the third.”
Lafreniere made it 2-0 for the Rangers at 2:56 of the third period, scoring a power-play goal off a pass that deflected off his foot. Reilly Smith passed the puck through his legs to Filip Chytil in the right circle, and Chytil found Lafreniere in the slot after he came around the far post.
Shesterkin kept his shutout intact with three saves in a two-second span, stopping Brady Tkachuk and two shots from Norris during a Senators power play midway through the third period.
“Those saves on the power play, that was crazy,” Lafreniere said. Gaudette finally got one past Shesterkin at 12:28 to make it 2-1. He scored with a one-timer from the left circle off a hard pass from Tkachuk across the slot.
Shesterkin stopped the final eight shots he faced, with Ottawa outshooting New York 20-5 in the third.
“I thought we played an unreal game,” said Senators forward Michael Amadio. “We just ran into a hot goalie.” Shesterkin’s save percentage is now .931, with 18 goals allowed on 262 shots in eight games. He started the game with a .923 save percentage.
“He’s the best goalie in the League and we’re lucky to have him,” Lafreniere said. “But we don’t want to give him that much work.”
