On March 4th, New York Islanders fans held their heads up high, as their team had defeated the New York Rangers 4-3 via shootout. Tonight the Rangers evened things up by taking a 4-1 victory against the Islanders and goalie Wade Dubielewicz, who saved 24 of 27 attempted shots. Starting Isles goalie Rick DiPietro was available for action, but head coach Ted Nolan chose Dubielewicz because of his impressive play of late.

“He’s (Wade Dubielewicz) a hot hand,” Nolan said. “You can second-guess yourself, ifs, ands, buts and everything else. I mean, Dubielewicz has been playing well. Ricky’s had three or four days off. It’s kind of unfair to put him into a situation like this. Now, he’s got two practices, and he’ll run with it from here on in.”

The first star of the game was Rangers goalie Henrik Lundqvist who saved 26 shots tonight. A close second was Rangers center Sean Avery who scored twice tonight, once in the first period and once in the third period. The rest of the Rangers’ goals were scored by Brendan Shanahan and Scott Gomez (Gomez’s goal was an empty-netter). Jaromir Jagr was not on the board tonight, and isn’t gaining any new fans among Ranger fans after refusing to participate in the game deciding shootout on March 4th against the Islanders.

“Not that we want to put ourselves in the situation where we’re going into the third periods with one-goal leads, but it’s certainly good practice,” said Sean Avery, who scored twice. “It’s good for us to have that in the back of our heads that we can go into the third and hold the lead.”

Islanders center and team captain Bill Guerin acknowledged the team’s frustration following the loss.

“It’s awful. It’s awful,” Guerin said. “We’ve tried to figure it out. We’ve tried to do different things every game. I don’t know what it is.”