Rangers Out-Matched In Carolina

The Carolina Hurricanes accomplished a feat Thursday night that had eluded them all season long a win over the New York Rangers.

Not only that, they had fun doing it.

In front of a home crowd of 15,426, the largest since their Nov. 21 game against the Rangers, the Hurricanes outshot, outskated and outfought the Rangers to take a 4-1 victory.

And the crowd roared with delight at every turn.

"The crowd got a little wild after our first goal. A crowd like this sure makes it easier to play a game," Carolina coach Paul Maurice said. "It fires the guys up. It gives them some intensity."

Trailing 1-0 after a sluggish first period, Carolina tied the game on Jeff O'Neill's first of two goals. Later in the second period, Martin Gelinas and Keith Primeau scored just 43 seconds apart to take a 3-1 lead. Carolina capped the win with a power-play goal by O'Neill in the third period

The Hurricanes outshot the Rangers 17-6 over the final 20 minutes and 29-16 for the game.

"Normally I say chase the puck out of our zone. This time I said, hit the nets harder after the first period," Maurice said.

Defenseman Jeff Beukeboom was ejected in the third period for fighting and the Rangers also played in the late stages without Wayne Gretzky and Ulf Samuelsson, who were both serving long penalties. Gretzky saw his current point-scoring streak end at six games.

"The third period was nothing but frustration coming to a head," Rangers coach John Muckler said.

With the win, Carolina (28-34-7) moved in front of New York (22-33-17) as the two chase Ottawa for the final playoff spot in the Eastern Conference. The Hurricanes trail Ottawa by five points with 13 games to go, while the Rangers remained seven behind the Senators with 10 games left on their schedule.

"Mathematically, I don't think we're out of it," Muckler said tersely to reporters following the game. "You guys are saying that, but I'm not. We're going to keep going out there and play to win."

The Rangers, whose defensive breakdowns cost them in Wednesday night's 3-2 overtime loss to Ottawa, gave up both second-period goals on intercepted passes around their own crease as they suffered their fifth straight road loss.

Gelinas gave Carolina a 2-1 lead at 17:43 of the second period by picking off a pass between the circles by the Rangers' Alexei Kovalev and then sailing the puck past goaltender Mike Richter (19-28-15). It was Gelinas' 12th goal of the season and his third game-winner for the Hurricanes in eight games.

Just 43 seconds later, newly-acquired forward Ray Sheppard assisted his old Detroit teammate Primeau by snatching a pass by Richter off the back rail and slipping it to the right post. Primeau was there waiting to slap in his 2rd goal and 19th point in 19 games.

"I had a lot of fun tonight," Sheppard said. "It's been a long time since I had this much fun in a game. There's a very positive atmosphere here. It's fun to work here."

New York scored first when Kovalev took a long pass down the middle from Jeff Beukeboom, split two Hurricane defenders and flipped the puck over Trevor Kidd's glove-side shoulder for his 17th.

New York played without center Pat LaFontaine, the Rangers' leading goal scorer, who was out with a head injury suffered March 16 against Ottawa.

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