Rangers’ frustration boils over in fourth consecutive home loss: ‘I honestly don’t know what else to do’

NEW YORK — Mika Zibanejad is often stoic and thoughtful in his postgame comments, offering tidbits of insight into plays or strategy, mostly without emotion.

It’s rare, as was the scene in the New York Rangers’ locker room after the club’s fourth consecutive home loss to open the season, that his frustration spills out publicly. But after so many scoring chances that have come up short, particularly in home games, he’d had enough.

“I have to score,” Zibanejad said in response to a question about his point-blank third-period opportunity that was stymied by Filip Gustavsson’s glove. “Yes, I understand that. But I’m getting to the chance. I’d be more worried if we didn’t get any chances, if I don’t get that chance, if we don’t get those chances. It’s frustrating for us. It’s frustrating for me. How many looks did we have? Not just this game, just overall. I honestly don’t know what else to do.”

Zibanejad’s frustration is understandable. Through the Rangers’ first four home games, he leads the club with a 1.81 individual expected goals for, per Natural Stat Trick. His 23 shot attempts in those home games also lead the club, and his nine high-danger chances are tied with J.T. Miller for the team lead.

And as a byproduct of the Rangers’ offense generating one goal in those four home games to date, Zibanejad has one assist.

In Monday night’s 3-1 home loss to the Minnesota Wild, Zibanejad put up an individual expected goals for of 0.27 (third on the team), four shot attempts, and two high-danger chances (second on the team). His best opportunity was the point-blank chance that Gustavsson robbed, set up by Artemi Panarin. In the third period, New York turned up the pressure and had nearly 60% of the expected goal share and out-attempted Minnesota 22-8 (more than 73% of the period’s share), per Natural Stat Trick.

Later, Zibanejad was asked about creating puck luck.

“We just have to keep going,” he said. “I don’t know. Do you have a better idea than what we’re doing right now? Honestly, it’s frustrating. And I understand that you guys got to ask the questions, but we have to bear down on chances. I have to score on that one.”

The Rangers’ issues on Monday began long before their third-period onslaught. After the first two shifts, in which New York opened the scoring and snapped its home goal drought 0:57 in, the Rangers were outmatched.

“We knew we were going to play a team that was going to come in with urgency,” said head coach Mike Sullivan. “We didn’t match the urgency. That was the challenge. We got outplayed tonight.”

Minnesota punished New York by forechecking hard, playing fast, and winning puck battles. At times, they forced the Rangers to turn the puck over — a prime example of which came at 15:11 of the first period, when Will Borgen took a delay-of-game penalty for clearing a puck over the glass.

Though the Wild did not score on the power play, their league-best man-advantage unit, which has operated at a 38.5% clip thus far, got three opportunities.

The Wild outshot the Rangers 16-6 in the opening frame, controlled more than 73% of the period’s shot attempts, and had nearly 82% of the expected goal share, according to Natural Stat Trick.

“They deserved to win tonight,” Miller said. “They played a more complete game than we did.”

If there’s any silver lining to Monday’s loss, it’s that the Rangers scored a goal at Madison Square Garden for the first time this season. Had the Rangers not scored in the first 7:19 of the game, they would have surpassed the 1928-29 Pittsburgh Pirates for the longest home goal drought to open a season, at 187:19.

It took New York less than a minute to put away that narrative.

On an early shift in the offensive zone, Zibanejad found Panarin cutting in front of the net. Panarin beat Gustavsson glove side 57 seconds into the game. Madison Square Garden roared for the first time since April.

But that was all the Rangers could generate. They’ve now scored one goal in 12 periods of hockey at The Garden to open the season — a metric that is statistically unlikely, given the Rangers’ potent scoring opportunities in those games and impressive road performances in between, but has left the club exasperated at what else it could do to generate more.

“I’m not going to point a finger at anything,” Miller said. “We need to bear down.”