It was a rollercoaster affair, but the New York Rangers defeated the Minnesota Wild 5-4 in overtime on Wednesday night. 

To start the night, Will Cuylle received the 2024-25 Steven McDonald Extra Effort Award, given annually to the Ranger who, as chosen by the fans, "goes above and beyond the call of duty."

The award ceremony provided a spark of energy at Madison Square Garden and was a special moment for Cuylle. 

“It’s a huge honor,” Cuylle said. “Such a long-standing tradition and to see the other names that have won the award, it’s pretty cool to be listed with some of those names… I’m proud of myself. I’m happy that the fans appreciate it. Happy they appreciate my hard work and something I can be proud of and share with my family.”

The Rangers started off the game well, possessing the puck and dominating in terms of shots. 

However, despite a strong 20 minutes and a goal from Braden Schneider, the Rangers still trailed 2-1 after the first period due to a couple of costly mistakes. 

New York continued pushing the pace in the second period, which translated with goals from K’Andre Miller, Chris Kreider, and Artemi Panarin. 

With the score tied 4-4 in the third period, the Rangers had some golden opportunities to run away with a victory as they had multiple power plays. 

The power play has been the Rangers’ Achilles Heel recently and that trend continued against the Wild. The Blueshirts went 0-4 on the man advantage and gave up a shorthanded goal even with all of the changes Peter Laviolette attempted to make with his first unit. 

“It’s moved around quite a bit,” Laviolette said of the power play. “It’s not like we are sitting stuck on one thing, we are moving things around. Trying different options that we work on in practice. We can look at it and look at the personnel that we have. 

“What we can do to make it effective inside the game like tonight, so there is no question that special teams can factor into a game. It’s been a real positive for us for a long time, but we are in a little bit of a funk right now with it and we’ll have to get out of it.”

The game ultimately went into overtime where Vincent Trocheck scored 24 seconds into the extra period to secure the Rangers a much-needed two points. 

Maybe the Rangers committed one too many turnovers and their play wasn’t always the prettiest, but aside from that, they were quick, explosive, and displayed a hard-fought effort that earned them a victory. 

“I liked the way we played,” Laviolette said. “I’d like to clean up a couple of things, but overall, we came out on the attack. We needed a win and guys found a way to do that. It was good to get a W in a game that went up and down, kind of went back and forth. Through the course of the 60 minutes, 61 minutes, I thought we pressured most of the night and pushed most of the night.”

The Rangers are now tied with the Montreal Canadiens for the second wild-card spot in the Eastern Conference with 79 points, but they’ve played one more game than their Canadian rival. 

Tuesday night also marked Gabe Perreault’s NHL debut. The Rangers signed the 19-year-old forward to a three-year, entry-level contract on Monday and he’s already making an impact. 

Perreault recorded 13:38 minutes playing on a line with J.T. Miller and Alexis Lafrenière while also serving a role on the second power-play unit. 

“It was super surreal,” Perreault said about his NHL debut. “Thankful for everyone who helped me get to this point. Obviously having some friends and family in the building was also unreal.”

Laviolette seemed to have a lot of trust in Perreault from the start of the game and he was impressed with the young forward. 

“I thought he was really good,” Laviolette said of Perreault. “You can see his game and the way he thinks the game out there. I thought he jumped in and looked good. I thought all four lines were really good. It was balanced, and we were able to roll them out there. 

“They all contributed. I thought he played a solid game, jumping into a big situation like that. I'm sure the next one and the one after that, they'll be a little bit more natural for him, as opposed to the first one. But I thought he played really well.”

The Rangers will be back in action on Saturday afternoon against the New Jersey Devils.