Rangers scoring goals, but Sullivan doesn't want to see 'reckless hockey'

"I look at it as my job is to identify when the risk becomes too great, when it turns into reckless hockey. We don't want to play reckless hockey because we can't win that way. Can't win consistently. You can win the odd night, but you're not going to win consistently playing a reckless game. That's what I try to do, is give them the latitude to act on their instincts."

"I don't think that it's one at the expense of the other. In other words, it's not a binary proposition. We can create a lot of offense off our defense, and we have. For this early part of the season, we've created a lot of offense. We didn't score goals early on. Now we're scoring goals. I don't think it's at the expense of playing defense. I think they go hand in hand. I think one actually helps the other in a lot of instances."

The Rangers produced 13 goals across two games while adopting a free-wheeling approach that increases offensive chances but also creates defensive risk. Coach Mike Sullivan supports giving top players latitude to act on instincts but stresses the need to rein in play when it becomes reckless, because reckless hockey prevents consistent winning. A recent game featured early scoring followed by three first-period goals allowed, illustrating the trade-off. The team aims to combine offense and defense, creating offense from defensive play, becoming hard to play against, and maintaining scoring without sacrificing defensive responsibility.

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