Rangers Notes: Islanders Ride Their Power Play and Edge Rangers Late, 6-4

Here are a few things that Rangers fans can take away from today's Rangers-Islanders game.

Regardless of the result, the Rangers offense seems to be firing on all pistons out the gate.  In two games, they have scored 10 goals, and not one of them has been scored by anyone named Marian.  

The Blueshirt's superstar winger, however, has played two monster games.  He has been contributing all over the ice, and not just in the offensive zone.  The best example came early in the first period with Brandon Prust in the penalty box, Gabby was paired with Brian Boyle for the penalty kill.  He drew a penalty shot with a takeaway at the top of the defensive zone.

Tortorella has gotten smarter about shuffling his lines.  Last season, it seemed as if Torts would shuffle a deck of Upper Deck player cards, and create his forward lines by randomly selecting three people to play together.  This season, from training camp until now, Tortorella has a discernible pattern to his line combinations.

Erik Christiensen has fallen victim to the Tortorella dog house already.  In the second period, Christiensen only played five shifts, after being on the ice for double that number in the first period. In the third, wunderkind Derek Stepan took his spot on the top line centering Gaborik and Frolov.  

How did that go? Well, even though the line failed to produce a third-period goal, they played smart hockey.

Michael Del Zotto still has room to grow.  The first Islander goal came on a Michael Del Zotto miscue.  He needs to be more aware of the world around him and try to make simple plays rather than going for the big play all the time.

All in all, the Rangers seem to have a lot of positive things going on.  However, they lost this game simply because they couldn't stay disciplined in their own zone.  They got into penalty trouble late and gave the game back to a very young Isles squad that they had on the ropes before giving up a goal late in the second. 

That's a lesson that I'm sure Tortorella will not let them forget in practice this week.