Nash leads Rangers past Oilers
NEW YORK -- Rick Nash scored twice as the New York Rangers ran their winning streak to a season-high six games with 4-2 victory over the Edmonton Oilers on Saturday.
Nash recorded his first multi-goal game since a hat trick Nov. 21, 2015 at Florida and 63rd overall. It was his 17th two-goal game since joining the Rangers in 2012 and first at home since Feb. 2, 2015.
Nash has five goals in his last four contests and both Saturday tallies occurred due to being in the right place at the right time. He finished off a 2-on-1 with Kevin Hayes 12:19 into the game and then buried a nice pass from defenseman Brady Skjei with 1:07 remaining in the second period while falling to the ice during a power play.
Pavel Buchnevich also scored a power-play goal and Michael Grabner added an empty-net goal for the Rangers, who also won their fifth straight home game.
Jesse Puljujarvi scored in his season debut and Connor McDavid scored on the power play for Edmonton, which was unable to win a season-high third straight game after overtime wins against the New York Islanders and New Jersey Devils.
Henrik Lundqvist made 27 saves for the Rangers, including a pad save on Oscar Klefbom with 24 seconds remaining.
Nash made it 1-0 with 7:41 remaining by finishing the odd-man rush with Hayes.
A little over four minutes later, Puljujarvi scored his second career goal by burying a wrist shot inside the far post over Lundqvist's glove.
The teams traded power-play goals in a span of 5:04 until Nash scored again.
McDavid scored his seventh goal by flicking a wrist shot from the right side under defenseman Marc Staal and Lundqvist with 9:54 left. Buchnevich scored with 4:50 left when he simply parked himself at the left side of the crease and lifted a pass from Kevin Shattenkirk by Cam Talbot (30 saves).
Nash then scored for the second time into a vacated net when he moved from behind the net to the left side of the crease. After getting the pass from Skjei, Nash lifted the puck over Talbot, who was facing to the right side.
NOTES: Edmonton RW Jesse Puljujarvi was in the lineup in place of LW Anton Slepyshev (groin), who went on injured reserve Friday. ... Rangers D Brendan Smith was a healthy scratch for the fifth straight game and eighth time overall. ... New York C Boo Nieves returned after missing the previous three games with a stomach bug. He skated on the fourth line with LW Michael Grabner and RW Jesper Fast. ... Edmonton LW Drake Caggiula missed his second straight game due to a foot injury. It was the fifth game overall Caggiula missed due to injury. ... Rangers LW Jimmy Vesey went to the locker room after getting hit in the mouth by Edmonton RW Zach Kassian's skate early in the second period. He returned in the third with a protective cage on his helmet.