Rangers vs. Red Wings: Five Days After Being Placed on Waivers, Dylan Garand Blanks Detroit 2-0

Five days. That is how long it took Dylan Garand to go from roster casualty to shutout goalie. On Sunday, New York cut him and put him on waivers. On Friday night, he was planted in the crease at Little Caesars Arena while the Detroit Red Wings took 22 shots at him and came away with absolutely nothing.

Garand stopped all 22 for his first NHL shutout, Sean Durzi scored on a first-period power play and Eeli Tolvanen iced it into an empty net as the Rangers blanked the Red Wings 2-0, spoiling Detroit's season opener in front of 19,515. It was only the fourth NHL game of the 24-year-old's career.

"This has been the craziest week of my life," Garand said. "I got cut Sunday and put on waivers, I cleared Monday and went to Hartford and found an apartment, had two practices there, then got called back up and I'm playing on Friday."

From Apartment Hunting to a Clean Sheet

Garand's path back to the NHL was not exactly a straight line. A fourth-round pick (No. 103) in the 2020 NHL Draft, he lost the race for the backup job behind Igor Shesterkin to Joonas Korpisalo. Then Korpisalo landed on injured reserve with a lower-body injury, and the Rangers came calling again. Garand had gone 2-0-1 in three appearances for New York late last season, so he was not a total stranger to the job.

The Rangers were the team with every excuse to look flat. This was their third game in four nights, the back half of a back-to-back after Thursday's 5-1 home win over Tampa Bay. Instead, they owned the opening stretch. Detroit coach Todd McLellan put it bluntly: "The first 10 minutes was a team playing their third game against a team that hadn't played in a week."

Nate Danielson's holding call at 3:31 opened the door, and Durzi walked through it at 5:12, ripping a slap shot from the high slot off a feed from Gabe Perreault, with Will Cuylle picking up the second assist. It was Durzi's first goal as a Ranger after he came over from the Utah Mammoth on July 1 as part of the Vincent Trocheck deal.

Detroit Pushes, Garand Shrugs

Durzi thought he had a second power-play goal at 7:10, but Detroit challenged for offside and won. That reprieve seemed to wake the Red Wings up. Anton Johansson, playing his first NHL game, rang a shot off the post later in the first.

"That was close," Johansson said. "I think (Andrew Copp) got a tip on it, but unfortunately, it just didn't go in."

Detroit pushed hard through the middle of the game. Marco Kasper dropped the gloves with Durzi at 12:13 of the second, and the crowd finally found its voice. The Red Wings had 20 shots through two periods, and Garand turned away every one of them.

"I thought we dominated the second half of the first period and the second period," Detroit defenseman Moritz Seider said. "We didn't bury our chances, though, and in the third period, we were always one or two passes away from making something happen."

The Third Period That Never Arrived

Here is the turning point, and it is a strange one: nothing happened. Down 1-0 at home with a full period to play, Detroit managed only two shots on goal in the third, according to NHL.com. The Rangers, running on fumes on paper, simply stopped giving up anything worth shooting at. Justin Faulk's slashing penalty at 1:28 even handed New York another power play, and the clock kept melting.

When Detroit finally pulled John Gibson for an extra attacker, Tolvanen finished it at 18:44, his second goal of the season, with Tye Kartye and Adam Fox assisting.

Gibson deserved better. He made 19 saves on 20 shots and kept a tired opponent within one for almost the entire night. But the Red Wings never solved a goalie who, earlier in the week, was apartment hunting in Hartford.

Star Watch

Dylan Garand: 22 saves on 22 shots in his first game of the season. NHL.com noted those 22 saves were the most by a Rangers rookie in a shutout since Shesterkin made 27 in a 3-0 win against the New Jersey Devils on April 13, 2021.

Sean Durzi: A power-play goal, a fight and seven penalty minutes in 19:19. His goal also ended one of the weirder stats in recent memory. Thanks to Shesterkin's empty-net goal on Thursday, Rangers goalies had outscored Rangers defensemen one to zero entering this game.

"When you come to a new team, you prepare yourself for any situation," Durzi said. "So far, they trust me to do that, and that gives me confidence."

Gabe Perreault: The setup on the winning goal plus two blocked shots in 15:24.

Adam Fox: An assist on the empty-netter in 22:50 of steady work on the back end.

John Gibson: 19 saves on 20 shots for Detroit, with the only goal against him coming on a power play.

Stats That Matter

• 22 for 22: Garand's line in the fourth NHL game of his career.
• 2: Detroit's shots on goal in the third period while trailing by one.
• 1 for 4: New York's power play. One was plenty. Detroit went 0 for 2.
• 36-29: Detroit's edge in faceoffs won, which bought it nothing on the scoreboard.
• 3 in 4: Games in four nights for the Rangers to open the season, and they won the last two.

What It Means

The Rangers are 2-1-0 with four points after opening the season with a 3-0 loss in Boston on Tuesday. Back-to-back wins on back-to-back nights, one with a goalie scoring and one with a goalie who cleared waivers on Monday stealing the show, is a fun way to steady the ship. They host Utah on Sunday.

Detroit starts 0-1-0 and hosts Winnipeg on Sunday. The Red Wings opened without Dylan Larkin, who is out with an upper-body injury, and unsigned defenseman Simon Edvinsson, and the lack of finish showed. McLellan did not sugarcoat it. "We're going to have to score some goals to win games," he said. "We had some good looks, but not nearly enough."

Closing Take

Garand's week plays like the training montage in a sports movie, only with more paperwork: cut, cleared, apartment, practice, recall, shutout. Rangers coach Mike Sullivan saw it as something bigger than one clean sheet. "This week speaks volumes about his character," he said. "Pro sports are competitive and things don't always go your way." Sometimes, though, they go exactly your way, 22 times in a row.

Stats from the official box score via ESPN. Game details from the Associated Press; postgame quotes and notes as reported by NHL.com.