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Drury, Rangers finally solve Islanders

Nov 30, 2007 - 4:26 AM By Larry Fleisher PA SportsTicker Contributing Writer

NEW YORK (Ticker) -- Typical plays by Chris Drury led to some unusual results for the New York Rangers.

Drury scored a power-play goal and set up Scott Gomez's go-ahead man-advantage tally as the Rangers held off the rival New York Islanders, 3-2, on Thursday night at Madison Square Garden.

Captain Jaromir Jagr had a goal and an assist and Henrik Lundqvist made 22 saves for the Rangers, who had dropped three straight one-goal games to open the eight-game season series with the Islanders.

"We wanted this badly," Lundqvist said. "You don't want to go 0-4. It's a big point. We had a tough loss last game and we definitely approached this one as a big one."

Brandon Dubinsky sealed the win with 3:16 to play by finishing off a beautiful series of passes from Jagr and Martin Straka, who had two assists.

Miroslav Satan had a power-play goal and Mike Comrie scored late in the second period for the Islanders, who were coming off a shootout victory over Ottawa on Wednesday at home.

The Rangers never trailed, thanks to a power play that scored twice for the first time in three weeks and just the fifth time all season.

Since going 2-for-4 against Pittsburgh on November 8, the Rangers were in a 2-for-38 slump with the man advantage. They also failed to score on their first two chances against the Islanders.

Drury changed that by doing what he does most of the time - park himself in front of the opposing goaltender. That's what he did to record his fifth multi-point game of the season.

"I think I feel a little better in front of the net as opposed to the point," Drury said. "I played the point a little bit, but I certainly feel more comfortable around the net, battling with their D."

Just 6:20 into the second, defenseman Dan Girardi took a shot from the right faceoff circle that Rick DiPietro stopped. The rebound caromed to Drury, who had plenty of time to put it past the netminder for his sixth goal of the season.

"He's had some very good games for us, and he's had games where he'd like to have been better," Rangers coach Tom Renney said of Drury. "Certainly tonight is one of those ones that could be a benchmark for him in terms of his standard for what he wants to play on a regular basis."

Exactly 10 minutes later, Drury found himself in the front of the net again after getting the rebound of a shot by Brendan Shanahan. Instead of shooting, Drury made a nice backhand pass to Gomez, who buried a wrist shot from the right circle past DiPietro.

"It's going to net," Shanahan said. "We took the puck a lot more on our power plays, and Drury's definitely a guy who was starting this year on the point on the power play, and I think that he's best when he's around the net. He just has a way of finding loose pucks."

"He did it all," Gomez said of Drury. "He got it right in the slot and I got lucky."

Gomez's fifth goal of the season and first in nine games turned out to be the game-winner, as Comrie made it a one-goal affair with just over two minutes remaining in the session.

The Rangers nursed the slim lead until the final minutes, when Dubinsky backhanded a puck past DiPietro off a perfect feed from Straka.

"Every time we turned the puck over, it turned into a power play or into the back of our net," DiPietro said.

DiPietro made 27 saves for the Islanders, who went 1-for-5 on the power play and were held to two goals or fewer for the 10th time in 11 games.

"The biggest thing was our power play," Islanders captain Bill Guerin said. "Our power play has failed us for way too long, and things have to change. It's just got to get better."

DiPietro also allowed more than three goals for just the fourth time this season.

The Islanders fell behind when Jagr finished off a nice feed by Dubinsky 9:18 into the game but tied it when Satan scored off scramble during a power play. The goal initially was credited to Trent Hunter but changed minutes later just before Drury's big night began.