Injuries are adding to Rangers' recent slide

GREENBURGH – It’s been enough of a struggle this season for the Rangers, who haven’t been able to win games at home, and now have stopped winning on the road.

They lost all three games on their recent trip to Vegas and the Rockies, and four in a row overall. And now they are suddenly beset with injuries.

An upper-body injury kept captain J.T. Miller out for a second straight game Monday, when the Rangers returned to Madison Square Garden for one night only to face the St. Louis Blues. Defenseman Will Borgen, who missed the previous two games – and three of the last four – with an upper-body injury, was placed on injured reserve on Sunday, and backup goaltender Jonathan Quick, who took a hit late in Saturday’s loss to Utah, was unavailable while being evaluated for a lower-body injury.

And if all that wasn’t enough, center Vincent Trocheck was a game-time decision Monday, coach Mike Sullivan said. Trocheck was held out of the morning skate “for precautionary reasons,’’ according to Sullivan.

But while injuries to such key players as Miller, Trocheck, Borgen and Quick certainly don’t help, the Rangers had problems before all those guys got hurt.

Their game has been deteriorating for the past few weeks. They haven’t been creating as many scoring chances as they were earlier in the year, and they haven’t been as tight defensively. Entering Monday, they had been outshot in each of their last four games, six of the last seven, and 8 of the last 10.

“When you look at the last handful of games versus the first dozen or so games that we played throughout the course of the year, I think we're two different teams,’’ Sullivan said at the morning skate. “The first dozen or so games, I think we were controlling games. We were outplaying teams. We were defending hard. We were one of the stingier teams defensively in the league. I think we generated a lot of offense – we just didn't score a lot of goals.

“The last handful of games, I think we're chasing offense. And as a result, we're not getting as much, and we're giving up a whole lot more,’’ he said. “And I don't think that's a recipe for success.’’

To the extent they have stayed afloat, it’s largely because of the play of their goaltenders, Igor Shesterkin and Quick, whose .944 save percentage was tops in the league for goalies who have played more than one game. But the goalies can’t carry the team by themselves.

In the five games before Monday, the Rangers scored nine goals (plus a shootout winner against Columbus Nov. 15 in their only win in that stretch), and their 2.48 goals per game was third-fewest in the league. And while they were generating scoring chances early in the season and just not scoring, now they’re not generating nearly as many chances.

“We’ve got to start playing like we did the beginning of the season,’’ utility forward Jonny Brodzinski said. “Maybe the pucks weren't finding the back of the net at the beginning of the year, but we were playing the type of hockey that we really wanted to play, stingy defensively, and we were getting a ton of chances.’’

There’s also the whole can’t-win-at-home thing. Entering Monday, they were 1-7-1 at the Garden this season. They’re going nowhere if that doesn’t change.

“Obviously we have to try to create, and keep creating some sort of swagger about our team at home,’’ Mika Zibanejad said. “So, we’ve got to find a way to get a good performance and a win today, build off of that.’’

Zibanejad did point out that with the way the schedule has been, it’s been hard to get into any kind of rhythm at home. Monday’s game was a one-off, coming between last week’s three-game road trip and this week’s upcoming two-game trip to Carolina Wednesday and Boston Friday. And their last home game, Nov. 16 against Detroit, was also sandwiched between a two-game trip and a three-game trip. That’s two home games and seven away games in a 16-day span.

“It's the weirdest schedule in my 10 years,’’ he said.

Notes & quotes:  In addition to putting Borgen on IR Sunday (retroactive to last Wednesday), the Rangers returned D Scott Morrow to AHL Hartford and recalled forward Brett Berard. Berard entered the lineup as a third-line right wing, with Noah Laba and Conor Sheary.

By Colin Stephenson

colin.stephenson@newsday.comColinSNewsday

Colin Stephenson covers the Rangers for Newsday. He has spent more than two decades covering the NHL and just about every sports team in the New York metropolitan area.