Some quick thoughts from the NHL on TSN panel on Wednesday night:
The big money guys came through for the New York Rangers in the end as they beat the Washington Capitals 2-1 in triple overtime.
The question now becomes whether this might cost them down the road if this series becomes a long one.
For both teams, you don't know how they are going to respond to such a long overtime. Triple-Overtime - this was the longest game of the year.
For the Rangers in particular, it maybe makes you ask,"did they win the battle but lose the war of attrition?"
When you look at the minutes logged, Ryan Mcdonagh had over 53 minutes of ice time.
In fact when you look at all of the Rangers' top four defencemen, McDonagh, Staal, Girardi, Del Zotto, they all played more minutes than Dennis Wideman who was the top guy for the Washington Capitals.
Keep in mind that Mcdonagh's 53 minutes were more than 12 minutes more than what Wideman played.
Mcdonagh played heroically, so did Girardi. But the Capitals also had 59 hits in this game and many of those were delivered on Ranger defencemen.
Obviously there is going to be sore bodies for both teams after this game and the two days of rest in between games is absolutely huge for both sides.
But you have to wonder how the Ranger defencemen are going to respond to the minutes logged, the hits taken and the number of shots they blocked in Game 3.
