MONTREAL — Maybe it was the energy in the Bell Centre, maybe it was the pressure of the situation, maybe it was just one of those awful performances that creep up at incredibly inopportune times.
But no matter what led to this scenario, the result was the Rangers creating a strange and alternate universe in which to play Game 5 of the Eastern Conference final, a style of game that was loose and open and undisciplined, a game that was entirely unlike the vast majority played by the Blueshirts to get them to this point.
It finished as a 7-4 loss to the Canadiens, and it kept the Rangers still longing for that most difficult fourth win in the series, their lead in this best-of-seven contest cut to 3-2 and these relentless Habs forcing a Game 6 at the Garden on Thursday night.
“The whole game just got out of whack,” said Brad Richards. “You can’t explain it. It’s just one of those games that’s a bizarre game.”
The most bizarre was not the hat trick from mercurial Montreal forward Rene Bourque, but the fact that Henrik Lundqvist, the Rangers goalie who has done all in his power to toss himself in the midst of the Conn Smythe Trophy conversation, skating his way to the locker room with 11:02 still left in the second period, yanked by coach Alain Vigneault.
By that point, the Rangers were down 4-1, and Vigneault said he wanted “a momentum shift,” placing backup Cam Talbot in for the rest of the game.
“Everybody talks about how … he’s a great goalie,” Bourque said of Lundqvist, who gave up four goals on 19 shots. “Has he been better than ‘Ticker’ [Montreal goalie Dustin Tokarski] this series? I don’t think so.’’
Lundqvist was pulled in the middle of a wild second period, one in which there were six combined goals, four in a span of 5:22. After he came out, the Rangers scored three in a row, going from Rich Nash to Derek Stepan and then, at the 14:12 mark, Chris Kreider actually tying it, 4-4.
“I thought it might catch everybody’s attention,” Vigneault said of pulling Lundqvist. “It did for a while. Obviously it didn’t work out.”
No, it didn’t, with Bourque getting his second of the night just 62 seconds after Kreider’s goal, allowing the Canadiens to go into the third with some real momentum that they would not relinquish.
“Absolutely it’s disappointing,” Lundqvist said. “I thought they had a little bit more desperation. They played well, but you need a short memory.”
Vigneault was asked if he thought about putting Lundqvist back in the game to start the third, with the Rangers down only 5-4. But the response was a succinct “No,” and now the Rangers are forced to regroup.
“I know it’s a lot of focus on me,” Lundqvist said, “but I think we all have to step up here.”
All the talk from the Rangers in the days leading up to this was about how they were going to be ready for the opportunity to become the first team since the Blueshirts of 1994 to make it to a Cup final. Yet 22 seconds in, Kreider took a bad tripping penalty, Alex Galchenyuk scored on the power play, and the Bell Centre was on fire.
Yet Stepan — playing admirably after missing one game since having surgery to place a plate in his broken jaw — got the first of his two goals midway through the first, which was then wiped out as Tomas Plekanec and Max Pacioretty made it 3-1, while Bourque got his first to make it 4-1, 6:54 into the second, essentially sending Lundqvist to the showers.
“They probably got a little hope, I would imagine,” Richards said. “But it doesn’t change how we think. We have to worry about ourselves and our game plan. We don’t play like that, and we won’t play like that next game.”
And if they do, it will lead into the third Game 7 of this postseason for the Rangers, and good fortune eventually wears thin.