LOS ANGELES — It was supposed to be Jonathan Quick's night.
And considering the future Hall of Fame goaltender was one of the few Rangers players who played in the team's 2-1 loss to the Kings on Saturday night at Crypto.com Arena. , that was to some extent.
Quick had to make good on his return to Los Angeles, where he spent 16 years and won two Stanley Cups before being traded, but the rest of the Rangers were unable to live up to their end of the bargain.
The last time the Rangers played the Kings at the Garden in December, winning 4-1, the team rallied around Quick, bouncing back from back-to-back losses in the first set of the season.
There wasn't the same passionate push from the Blueshirts this time around for a Kings team that had lost 10 of its past 11 games heading into Saturday's contest.
The magnitude of the moment didn't shock his teammates.
Nor did head coach Peter Laviolette change the lineup by replacing Tyler Pitlick with Nick Bonino.
Rangers played mediocre, suffering their sixth loss in their last eight games.
Despite Quick's efforts, withstanding 12 shots on the night compared to Kings goaltender David Rittich, who made 22 saves in the first period alone, the Rangers had consistent offensive zone time. They struggled to maintain and fell behind early on.
Trevor Moore's spin-o-rama pass hit Kevin Fiala's stick, beating Braden Schneider and depositing the puck past Quick with 34.4 seconds left in the opening frame.
The Rangers were limited to just two shots on goal in the first 20 minutes, their last one coming at the 3:51 mark. The next shot didn't come until 6:16 of the second period. That means the Rangers went 22 minutes and 25 seconds without taking a shot on goal.
It may have been a dip in energy, but the Rangers looked stuck in the mud at times.
Rittich didn't have to work too hard on this shot, stopping 22 of 23 shots. Even though the Rangers got a power play with less than two minutes left in regulation time, their best chance came on a rebound by Alexis Lafreniere, but they couldn't capitalize.
Still, the visitors' lead somehow remained at one point until Adam Fox's long feed through traffic to Chris Kreider tied it in the center field. They were lucky to have a 1-1 game at this point, but Rangers couldn't even generate much momentum from the goal.
Compared to how the Rangers played to win Quick's homecoming, the Kings seemed to be pushing much harder to ruin Quick's homecoming.
Jarrett Anderson-Dolan then skated around Quandre Miller and tried to put the puck in the net, but the puck was saved by Quick before the Rangers defenseman's clearance attempt was intercepted by Quinton.・It hit Byfield's stick and resulted in the go-ahead goal, resulting in 2 points. -1.
It would have been the perfect time for an emotional game like the first time the Rangers faced the Kings this season.
It's generally hard to find emotion in Rangers games these days.
