Rangers-Capitals shootout gets weird as Georgiev throws stick at Ovechkin

The Rangers have lost 2,795 games throughout their 92-season history, and in many, many different ways, but never had they lost one on Rule 25.4.

Until Sunday afternoon, that is, when Alex Ovechkin was awarded a decisive shootout goal to give the Caps a 3-2 victory at the Garden when Alex Georgiev threw his stick at the puck as No. 8 deked and made a move to the right.

“It’s tough to explain [what happened], but he faked the shot, I went down early, and as he was moving laterally, I kind of threw my leg and the stick at the same time,” said Georgiev, whose leg stayed attached to his body but whose stick knocked the puck away from Ovechkin. “It’s a tough call.”

It was the right call. If a goaltender throws his stick at the puck during normal play, that results in a penalty shot. But if a goaltender throws his stick at the puck on a penalty shot, that results in an awarded goal.

Shootout attempts are treated like penalty shots, though the officials on the ice first refused to make any call and then waved off any goal while Ovechkin looked on in disbelief. A quick review by the folks in Toronto upheld the following rule of law:

Rule 25.4: “A goal will be awarded when a goaltender attempts to stop a penalty shot by throwing his stick or any object at the player taking the shot or by dislodging the goal …”

So, OK. If Georgiev, who lost his first shootout after winning his first three NHL skills competition this season, had actually thrown his leg at the puck, that would have been an awarded goal, too. Just so that is clear.

Georgiev, who’d stopped 11-of-14 attempts entering this one, was one save away from winning it. But with a 2-1 edge going into the bottom of the third round after both Kevin Shattenkirk and Tony DeAngelo had beaten Braden Holtby, Georgiev was beaten short side by Nicklas Backstrom. Then, after a miss by the reinstated Filip Chytil, No. 40 was 25.4’d.

That shouldn’t detract from Georgiev’s afternoon, the netminder having stopped 37-of-39 shots through 65 minutes that included a couple of dandy stops on Ovechkin left wing one timers and one on a Great 8 overtime breakaway. The Bulgarian is 4-1-2 with a .920 save percentage and 2.78 GAA over his last seven starts.

“He’s playing with a lot of confidence, for sure,” said David Quinn, who has split the last dozen games down the middle between Georgiev and Henrik Lundqvist. “People don’t just give you confidence. Confidence comes from hard work and doing things the right way. That’s something he’s done all year. He’s built up towards this, and I’m not surprised at the level he’s playing.”

The Blueshirts came with an honest effort even if they were dominated throughout much of the second period in which they were outshot 20-7 and out-attempted 30-14 at even strength. But the Rangers for the most part maintained their structure without the puck and denied the Caps easy chances. The goaltender played a part in that, too.

“It was really lopsided in the second and he controlled the game really well,” said Marc Staal, who has had better days than this one. “Just with his rebound placement, he was swallowing up pucks and calmed a lot of things down for us. He was outstanding.”

This one was nowhere near as nasty or edgy as last Sunday afternoon’s 6-5 overtime defeat in Washington. Matt Niskanen got away with a dangerous hit against DeAngelo, but the match was played whistle-to-whistle. And the Rangers competed, Quinn reacting to events by switching line combinations liberally as the match evolved, giving more ice time and responsibility to Chytil and Pavel Buchnevich and less to a struggling Brendan Lemieux.

Buchnevich, in fact, scored the 2-2 tying goal at 14:20 of the second period when Chytil, put down on the ice in front by Dmitry Orlov, swept a rebound off a right point DeAngelo drive to Buchnevich, who drilled one home. Ryan Strome had opened the scoring on the game’s first shift before Carl Hagelin and Andre Burakovsky lifted the Caps into the lead.

The defeat left the Rangers 0-1-3* in their last four, which also is their record in the completed season series against the defending Cup champs. The asterisk denotes Rule 25.4. But you knew that.