Stuck in a rut the past week, the Utah Mammoth are searching for the positive vibes of their 8-2-0 start to the season.
The Mammoth hope to end a four-game losing streak (0-1-3) on Saturday night when they face the New York Rangers in Salt Lake City.
Utah scored 36 goals during a seven-game winning streak Oct. 15-26 as part of their hot start. Since then, the Mammoth are 2-6-3 in their past 11 games and have been outscored 41-26.
Before Thursday’s 4-1 home defeat against the Vegas Golden Knights, the Mammoth took three straight overtime losses to the New York Islanders, Anaheim Ducks and San Jose Sharks.
“There’s going to be adversity,” Utah captain Clayton Keller said. “It’s a long season, it’s hard. It’s the best league in the world and I think our group has continued to stay motivated and confident, still going through tough stretches. There’s something that we want to attack and get better at, and we address it, we usually do and respond right away.”
On Thursday, the Mammoth gave up three goals in the second period, including two in 19 seconds. On Tuesday, they allowed two goals to the Sharks’ Macklin Celebrini in a span of 4:11 in the first period before he completed the hat trick in overtime.
Utah’s skid is occurring as some of its top scorers slightly cool down.
Keller had the secondary assist on a goal by Nate Schmidt on Thursday and has three goals and seven points over his last 11 games. Nick Schmaltz, who leads the team with 22 points, has three goals and three assists over that span, while Logan Cooley has five of his 16 points during the 11-game slide.
The Rangers are back to NHL .500 at 10-10-2 after allowing six goals for the second time this season in Thursday’s 6-3 road loss to the Colorado Avalanche.
New York is on its second three-game losing streak after going 7-2-0 in its previous nine and has dropped consecutive road games for the first time.
J.T. Miller, who was vocal about his slow start following Tuesday’s 3-2 loss in Vegas, scored two power-play goals Thursday. He scored his second goal with 9:42 left in the third period but the Rangers allowed a tiebreaking goal to Nathan MacKinnon 30 seconds later before giving up two empty-netters.
Miller scored after he was moved to right wing alongside Artemi Panarin and Vincent Trocheck, while Alexis Lafreniere shifted to the right side on a line with Mika Zibanejad and Will Cuylle.
“The one thing that nobody could ever question with J.T. is his care factor and his try factor. He cares deeply about this team and wants to have success,” New York coach Mike Sullivan said of Miller, who has six goals and 12 points. “He also understands that this team relies on him in so many different ways, but offensively in particular, for whatever reason, it’s been a bit of a struggle for him to score consistently at this point. So to score two tonight, I think, is huge for him.”
While Miller scored, the Rangers finished with 19 shots on goal for the third straight game and were held under 30 shots for the 14th time. New York struggled offensively despite getting two power-play goals and a 7-for-17 success rate on the man advantage over its past eight games.
