NEW YORK – Suggesting that Henrik Lundqvist is on the decline and should no longer be considered an elite goaltender might need to come with a warning label. It could prove hazardous to one’s opinion.

The Ducks easily played their best game of their winding trip. Possibly their best in a long while. And yet they trudged out of Madison Square Garden with a 4-1 loss to the New York Rangers on Tuesday night because they met up with a vintage Lundqvist who they couldn’t easily solve.

It was just last month when Lundqvist, 34, allowed 20 goals over a four-start stretch. His season numbers – 2.69 goals-against average and .910 save percentage – are well off his career averages. But he’s been more like the backbone that’s kept the Rangers a contending team over his 12 seasons.

That is what the Ducks came across in their lone visit to New York. Lundqvist made a season-high 43 saves and New York took advantage of its chances, which were few in number but high in quality.

“There is no doubt that Hank was on top of his game right from the start,” said Rangers coach Alain Vigneault, who got his 600th win.

The Ducks (28-17-10) have three straight losses to start their six-game trip. Jakob Silfverberg got their only goal in the second period while the Rangers got goals from three players. Michael Grabner scored twice in the third, the latter one into an empty net.

Ducks goalie John Gibson needed to make just 16 saves but he had to keep his team close with a few highlight-reel stops. Two came in the second when Gibson robbed Grabner with a glove save on a breakaway and then used his blocker on a lunging stop to foil Jimmy Vesey.

Still, the Ducks couldn’t use that to their advantage. The Ducks couldn’t crack Lundqvist during a four-minute high-sticking penalty to Rangers defenseman Brady Skjei in the second.

“The goaltender is a big equalizer from a perspective of we had 40-something shots,” Ducks coach Randy Carlyle said. “We kept them to 20. It’s not that our goalie played bad.

“The goals that they got were goals that were easily defendable. So that’s what stings. And then we didn’t create enough.”

The Ducks had a season-high 44 shots on goal and were decisively ahead in attempts and possession but couldn’t solve Lundqvist. They came out with a lot of energy and hemmed the Rangers in their own zone with the first few shifts. The start was just what Carlyle wanted.

And then when the Ducks had to defend for the first time, they failed. Pavel Buchnevich, a fourth-liner with some skill, flipped a no-look backhand pass to an open Oscar Lindberg at the net as Ducks defenseman Kevin Bieksa failed to get a stick on it. Lindberg quickly converted.

“If you watch the play, I went across and tried to block the shot,” Bieksa said. “He ran into my leg and my leg went a little bit numb there. I got up, I couldn’t really move to well so I just kind of put my stick out. And he made a short-side pass and the guy came out of the slot and batted it in.

“Obviously we’d like to have that play over as a group. It’s 1-0 and we’re out-playing them. That’s not the game right there. It’s just an unfortunate play.”

It did set an opportunistic tone for the Rangers. Mats Zuccarello gave New York a 2-0 edge early in the second when he jumped on a puck and hammered it by a sprawling Gibson. Silfverberg halved the deficit when he put in Andrew Cogliano’s pass to cash in a forced turnover on Skjei.

But in the third, Grabner continue his remarkable comeback season by scoring his 25th off a cross-ice pass from J.T. Miller before adding his team-leading 26th. He had nine goals in 80 games with Toronto last season.

Meanwhile, the Ducks could simply use goals. They’ve scored four times in their three losses, and they’re in real danger of falling into third place in the Pacific Division.

“We’re at a point in this season where, to me, this is one of the hardest points of the year,” Ducks captain Ryan Getzlaf said. “It is every season. You got through that February stretch and it’s hard work. Teams are starting to get desperate now.

“We got to up our intensity level every night and really drive until our next break. That’s essentially what we’re looking at it as. We got to finish this trip the right way and we can still salvage this trip.”

Contact the writer: estephens@scng.com

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