New York-Atlanta: Gomez Scores in OT, Rangers Beat Thrashers

The Rangers beat the Atlanta Thrashers, 3-2.

And they didn’t need a shootout to do it. Miracles do happen. They did need overtime however, but not much of it, as Scott Gomez scored the game-winner only 18 seconds into the extra period.

Mixologist Tom Renney shook up his lines. Can you imagine that? Does he have any idea what he’s doing anymore?

Gomez, Markus Naslund, and Nikolai Zherdev were back together. Chris Drury centered Ryan Callahan and Nigel Dawes. Fredrik Sjostrom was bumped up to the third line, with Brandon Dubinsky and Aaron Voros.

And the fourth line, which has been glued together all year, even saw a change, with Lauri Korpikoski joining Blair Betts and Colton Orr. Petr Prucha had a much-needed night off, after playing three grueling games in a row. He was rewarded for his hustle and clutch goal against Pittsburgh by being benched.

The Dubinsky line was hitting and putting pressure on Atlanta all night. Voros was causing trouble in front of the net, where he belongs, and Gomez' line scored the winner. So the lines will probably be completely different on Friday. If Renney uses the same lines two games in a row, he’ll most likely explode.

The goals weren’t beautiful to look at, but the puck went into the net. Hallelujah. Orr scored his first goal in 83 games (no, I’m not kidding). With goalie Johan Hedberg without his stick, Voros was parked in front and slipped the puck to Orr, who banged it home.

The second goal was a shorthander. Dubinsky threw the puck to the net with Callahan crashing. The puck was sticked away by Hedberg right into the right winger’s chest and flew across the goal line.

And the OT goal looked just like that one, with Naslund whipping the puck in front and Gomez sliding it in. That’s what the Rangers need to do however, crash the net. The fancy individual stuff doesn’t work. Meat and potatoes.

Steve Valiquette gave Henrik Lundqvist a night off and was excellent. The Rangers were caught on a slow line change (look for the foreshadowing here) in the first period, giving Atlanta a two-on-one, but Valiquette made a spectacular save on Colby Armstrong to save their bacon (he also robbed Jason Williams with a minute-and-a-half left in regulation, among other highlight-reel saves).

But later in the first, the Blueshirts were guilty of another slow line change (which has been happening all season), and Johnny Crabb (wasn’t he in Goodfellas, hanging out with Johnny Roast Beef and Jimmy Two Times?) split Paul Mara and Dmitri Kalinin and put one past Valiquette.

Kalinin was -2 and is now at -17 for the year. His plus/minus is starting to look like a typical winter day in Green Bay. Wade Redden, though, actually looked competent, going +3 with three assists, and Dan Girardi was also +3.

Scott Gomez is turning into an enforcer. After “fighting” Saku Koivu in Montreal, he landed some punches on Ilya Kovalchuk, but got a four-minute roughing penalty again.

What does he have to do to get that extra minute? Those two got another two minutes later in the game. Maybe Gomez will take on Patrick Elias in the Rangers next game on Friday in Newark.