NEW YORK -- He can change games, this kid.
His New York Rangers teammates may deserve more credit for flipping this one, for turning an embarrassing two-period effort into a stunning 5-4 win over the Minnesota Wild. But at the end, they still needed 19-year-old Anthony Duclair.
At the end, it was the kid who scored the game-tying goal with just 3:48 to play. At the end, it was Duclair who was wearing the team's Broadway Hat after scoring his first NHL goal in just his seventh NHL game.
"The Duke of New York is looking good," Dan Girardi said. "He's a big-time player, and that was a big goal."
The Rangers can still look like a big-time team, even if injuries and inconsistent (and sometimes ugly) play have contributed to a so-so 5-4-0 record as they come to the end of October. And you'd think this should be a big win, with a five-goal third period against a team that had allowed just six goals total in the first six games of the season.
You'd think the kid can build on it for sure, that Duclair can go on and show the Rangers that he belongs in the NHL right now, and not back with his junior team in Quebec. You know he has to be thinking that, especially after this night.
"Yeah, probably the best day of my life," Duclair said. "My first goal, in Madison Square Garden, to tie the game. I put everything I had into it."
The Rangers put everything they had into the third period, a period so good that it basically erased the memory of how bad the first two periods had been. They played so well in the third that it was hard to remember they were two players short, that they had lost Chris Kreider to a game misconduct in the final seconds of the first period and then John Moore to a match penalty midway through the second.
It was hard to remember that they'd been outshot 24-8 and outscored 3-0 over those first two periods, that their lack of discipline led to so much time short-handed that Duclair (who doesn't kill penalties) had only six minutes of ice time.
They were bad, and coach Alain Vigneault said goalie Henrik Lundqvist had a few choice words for his teammates when they returned to the locker room for the second intermission.
Vigneault, who had made yet another lineup shuffle and yet another line shuffle going into this game, had to shuffle again with Kreider out of the game. Kreider began the night alongside Derick Brassard and Mats Zuccarello, but with Kreider out, Vigneault put Rick Nash on that line.
It could hardly have worked out better. Nash and his linemates were everywhere from the moment the puck dropped to start the third period. They helped create Kevin Klein's goal 2:52 into the period, and it was Nash himself who scored the second goal at 4:48 (his NHL-leading ninth of the season). The Wild got one back to make it 4-2, but then Brassard scored quickly to make it 4-3.
That set up the Duclair goal that tied the game, and the Zuccarello goal 37 seconds later to win it, giving the Rangers their first third-period three-goal comeback for a win in nearly 20 years.
It was the first goal of the season for Zuccarello, who had 19 goals last season but was beginning to wonder when the first one would come this season. He may remember this one, but there's no way he'll remember it as long as the kid will remember his.
It may well turn out that what Nash, Brassard and Zuccarello did in the third will have more impact on this Rangers team than what Duclair did.
"That's one of the best periods I've seen three guys play in a long time," Vigneault said. "The Brassard line took over, gave us momentum."
The trio changed the game, without a doubt. But it was the kid who tied the game.
And it's the kid who will long remember it.
Remember the North Stars? According to the Elias Sports Bureau, the last time the Rangers overcame a three-goal deficit entering the third period to win a game was on Feb. 21, 1992, against the Minnesota North Stars. The only other time in team history that they came back from 3-0 down entering the third and won the game was on Jan. 4, 1956, in a 5-4 win over the Detroit Red Wings.