The New York Rangers played what was perhaps their worst period of the season on Tuesday night when they allowed the Tampa Bay Lightning to jump out to a 2-0 lead and were outshot 21-6. That was against a Tampa Bay team that was already playing without Steven Stamkos, Victor Hedman, Anton Stralman and Ryan Callahan when the night started, and briefly lost two other players, Alex Killorn and Vladislav Namestnikov during the game.
Namestnikov had to leave when he was on the receiving end of a senseless late hit from Rangers forward Tanner Glass.
Here is a look at the play.
Glass ended up earning a five-minute major for interference for that hit and was also ejected from the game. Namestnikov ended up returning to the game for the start of the second period.
It is unclear if Glass made direct contact with Namestnikov's head on that play (it looked to be shoulder to shoulder), but even if he didn't the real issue here is just how pointless that type of contact is.
The puck is long gone, it's a blindside hit on an unsuspecting opponent that is not eligible to be checked and should not reasonably be expecting to get checked, and Glass goes out of his way to start initiating that contact after the puck has already been moved. That is not what finishing your check is, and that is the exact type of hit that needs to be gone from the NHL if the league is serious about trying to do more to protect its players. Longer suspensions might help send that message, but that really seems unlikely here given that there did not seem to be any major head contact and Namestnikov returned to the game.
The Rangers ended up bouncing back from their brutal start and scored three consecutive goals to win, 3-2.
The Lightning still clinched a playoff spot thanks to the Boston Bruins' shootout loss to the Carolina Hurricanes.
