I didn’t have a chance to update the last few days, but it doesn’t seem to matter at this point. The Rangers have been writing the same story for three games now, a story of disappointment.

How do you go from playing your two best games to your two worst games? The way the Rangers played against the Islanders and Senators and then against the Hurricanes and Leafs is only even more stinging with the loss to the Thrashers. Against the “Canes and the Leafs, the Rangers just didn’t show up to play. Against Atlanta, for part of the game at least, they seemed intent on reverting to their play from the two victories. Yet the problems they faced were reminiscent of the way the team looked before the Islander game. Only now, the close game didn’t go their way for once.

Once again, the Rangers are displaying significant problems scoring goals. Despite outshooting their opponents significantly, the team just can’t score goals with any level of consistency. Yes, you can make the argument that Steve Valiquette let in a bad goal or two, but that doesn’t change the fact that good teams have to score more than two goals a game on a consistent basis. It’s an especially frightening situation when Henrik Lundqvist plays the way he did against Carolina and Toronto.

All the good things that the Rangers did against the Isles and Sens seemed to evaporate over the last three games. For one, the Jagr line, except for some brief spurts last night against the Thrashers, reverted back to a messy, disorganized group. The dominance that Jaromir Jagr displayed in those two wins was absent, with Brandon Dubinsky and Martin Straka showing little in the way of chemistry.

As nice as it is that Scott Gomez seems to be consistently racking up assists, it hasn’t gone unnoticed how many shifts for his line are wasted thanks to his turning the puck over upon entering the offensive zone. He had two assists in the Toronto game, yet ended up minus two. Brendan Shanahan’s stats read the same way.

The Drury line exhibited the kind of work ethic that has become expected from all three players of late, resulting in a goal against Atlanta. All in all, however, they too need to be producing more offensively.

It really shouldn’t be surprising, though, that the Rangers have trouble scoring. Consider their roster. Some teams have fourth lines that regularly contribute offensively. They’re not racking up the same number of points the first liners are, but when they score, it isn’t a special occasion, the way it is for the Blueshirts. The Rangers fourth line is not a line that is going to put up more than a small handful of goals per season. So that’s already three guys from whom you won’t get scoring.

Then you have guys like Petr Prucha and Marcel Hossa. It’s good that Hossa got his first of the season against Atlanta, but between the two of them, they have three goals this season. Blair Betts and Colton Orr have two between them, so essentially Prucha and Hossa are scoring at the same pace that the fourth line is.

Ryan Callahan and Brandon Dubinsky are the guys most likely to break out of the slump and start scoring, but until that happens, the team is left with Jagr, Straka, Shanahan, Gomez and Drury, as well as a healthy Sean Avery as the guys scoring goals. That means the team is relying on essentially six guys to score, six guys who aren’t exactly doing that great a job of it right now.

In today’s NHL, you need contributions from everywhere. Thankfully, the defense has started to put pucks in the net on a regular basis for the Rangers, which is certainly a good thing. However, until more of the forwards start scoring, the Rangers will continue to barely get by, if at all.

More on the Devils game later on…