Additional Quotes and Thoughts from Today's 2-1 SO Win

Just to follow up with the Rangers Tribune's postgame coverage of today's 2-1 shootout victory over the Ottawa Senators at Scotia Bank Place, here are some additional quotes from the the head coach as well as the players in their postgame meetings with the media courtesy of Ranger Rants. I also added some of my personal thoughts that I did not include in my postgame article earlier in the day.

Henrik Lundqvist on the constant traffic in front of him:

“I’m really trying to be square because they’re good at getting people in front,” Lundqvist said. “It was an intense game.”

Lundqvist was the main reason the Blueshirts walked away with any points in this one, let alone two. I thought he should have stopped the Spezza shootout goal from going in--which he admits--but he shutdown every other Senator he faced from there on out, so there are no complaints coming from myself.

John Tortorella on the play of Chris Higgins:

“He played well,” Tortorella said. “He was hard on the puck. He is getting better and better the last four or five games. I don’t want to screw him up by playing center because his game has come but he’s going to play there. He played a little bit last year in Montreal and, right now, with the situation we’re in, he’s going to be there. He almost won the game for us in regulation. He hit the post. He had a couple of chances there but he played well.”

Higgins was three for 10 in faceoffs, not all that much of an improvement from Brian Boyle who he is essentially replacing. Other than that, I felt that Chris played a solid game today, even though he may not have been extremely noticeable, he still did what he was expected of him and did not make any blatant mistakes.

Vinny Prospal on his first career shorthanded goal and the overall contest:

“It gave us a little bit of life,” Prospal said. “The last five minutes of the second period we played much better than the first 15. We didn’t have any momentum. Henrik was incredible for us, especially in the second period. He’s the key why we were still in the game."

Prospal, once again, was one of the better players for the Rangers this afternoon, and continues to excel playing with Marian Gaborik. I found it pretty amazing that this was Prospal's first shorthanded goal of his career, but when you think about it, he never really played on the penalty killing units for his former teams prior to the Rangers So it makes sense that he wouldn't have too many shorties on his stat sheet.

John Tortorella on Marian Gaborik and the Penalty Kill:

“Gabby, he backs teams off,” Tortorella said. “He’s done that all year long killing penalties. It makes them maybe back off the blue line at times. We’re hoping we score more shorthanded goals like that with him and Vinny. More important was the four on three we killed at the end. That was huge for us with Cally and Staalsy and Danny. That was big. With the type of people they have on the ice, that was really big and it gained us two points.”

As I mentioned in the original postgame article this afternoon, Gaborik made a phenomenal play to slow the rush down, wait for Prospal to join him, and then lob the puck over the defenseman's stick and onto Vinny's blade for the one-timer. And as Torts mentioned above, Callahan, Girardi, and Staal were great on the penalty kill today, especially late in overtime when they blocked shot after shot thrown at them by Ottawa.
(Image courtesy of AP Photo)