The Pittsburgh Penguins and NY Rangers are playing live on the NHL schedule on Tuesday and the game is from Madison Square Garden starting up at 7 pm ET in New York and this is the first matchup at MSG for the teams since the playoff series last year that saw the Blueshirts come back against Sidney Crosby from 3-1 down and now Henrik Lundqvist and Rick Nash will have to get it done.
The Rangers have not been playing well as of late and they have been struggling against weak teams and now they have one of the best teams in the conference and the league coming into the Garden. Derek Stepan has returned for the team, but they are without captain Ryan McDonagh and it has been showing and now the Rangers have to find a way to pull together for this matchup.
Rick Nash is tops on the team in goals and points to start the season and he has actually been on a nice tear with 11 goals overall. Nash needs to keep things going and the Rangers need to play better as a team and especially on defense. The team was all over the rink against the Oilers and they also were a mess against the Toronto Maple Leafs and now they have to get some points going. The team has 14 points and they come in after a loss against the Oilers that was a 3-1 game.
The team lost before that to the Maple Leafs and now they are 6-6-2 on the season and fifth in the Metro division. The Rangers got off to a bad start last season and everyone thought the sky was falling and then they made it to the Cup, but this has a different feel to it. The team plays against the Avalanche next and they come into the game at 13th in the league in goals per game this season. The Penguins have been one of the best teams in the league and they have 21 points already and are leading the division and this is a huge matchup for the Rangers now.
Last season these two teams played an epic series and it was historic on both sides, as the Penguins gave up a huge lead and the Rangers made one of their biggest comebacks ever. The team was down 3-1 in the series, but with the help of the King and Martin St. Louis, they were able to come back and they won the series to advance to the east finals. Sidney Crosby was held in check for most of the series and so was Evgeni Malkin and that allowed the Rangers to win it. The team advanced to play the Canadiens in the east finals and won that in six to advance to the Stanley Cup, where they lost to the Kings.
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