Kadri has goal, assist, Flames defeat Rangers to end 3-game skid

NEW YORK -- Nazem Kadri had a goal and an assist for the Calgary Flames, who ended a three-game skid with a 2-1 win against the New York Rangers at Madison Square Garden on Tuesday.

Matt Coronato also scored, and MacKenzie Weegar had two assists for the Flames (31-25-11), who were 0-2-1 in their previous three games and had lost 10 of 15 (5-6-4), including 6-2 at the Toronto Maple Leafs on Monday in the opener of a four-game road trip. Dan Vladar made 12 saves.

Calgary trails the Vancouver Canucks and St. Louis Blues by two points for the second wild card into the Stanley Cup Playoffs from the Western Conference. St. Louis won 4-1 at the Nashville Predators on Tuesday, and Vancouver won 6-2 against the Winnipeg Jets.

“It’s character, everybody doing whatever it took tonight to win -- blocking shots, scoring timely goals,” Kadri said. “… We showed some great character and played one of our best games of the year, I think.”

Artemi Panarin scored to extend his season-high point streak to 10 games for the Rangers (33-30-6), who have lost their past two, both at home. Igor Shesterkin made 33 saves.

New York fell one point back in the race for the second wild card in the Eastern Conference with the Montreal Canadiens’ 6-3 win against the Ottawa Senators on Tuesday. Montreal has two games in hand.

“[The compete] was not there -- there was nothing there,” Rangers coach Peter Laviolette said. “They were faster than us, they were more ready. That’s the way they game played out.

“It’s concerning for any time of year when you don’t play a game that you’re proud of, so it was not a good showing.”

Panarin scored his 30th goal of the season at 1:13 of the first period to give New York a 1-0 lead. Urho Vaakanainen sent a pass from the Rangers blue line through the neutral zone to Panarin, who scored on a 2-on-1 with Vincent Trocheck with a wrist shot from the left face-off circle.

Panarin has 14 points (seven goals, seven assists) during his 10-game streak.

“It looked like, no [we didn’t play hard enough],” Panarin said. “But I’m sure everyone tried. I don’t know. It’s hard to say exactly [what happened]. … We’ve got to be sharper.”

Kadri tied it 1-1 at 10:22, knocking in a rebound in front after Shesterkin made the initial save on Weegar’s backhand attempt.

Coronato, a Long Island native, gave Calgary a 2-1 lead with a power-play goal at 18:03 when he took a pass from Kadri, spun and sent a wrist shot from the edge of the right circle past Shesterkin.

“It was awesome,” Coronato said. “Great kind of bounce-back after last night and get a big win. There was definitely a lot [of family]. I’m grateful for the support.”

The Rangers were limited to three shots on goal in the second period, including none in the last 11:01.

“I think it’s the whole game; it’s not just the second period,” New York forward Mika Zibanejad said. “Even the third period, I’m disappointed that we don’t have a better push than that. It’s not good enough.”

Chris Kreider had a chance to tie it for New York at 7:46 of the third period, but Vladar got across the crease to gobble up a one-timer from the slot after a feed from Panarin.

Shesterkin kept it a one-goal game at 13:26 when he stretched out his right pad to deny Jonathan Huberdeau’s redirection of a feed from Morgan Frost.

“That’s one of the best that we’ve played all year for sure,” Flames coach Ryan Huska said. “We gave one up early, which is never a good thing, but I just felt like the guys were committed to doing things the right way tonight.

“I thought their goalie was excellent. I thought this was one where we could’ve scored more than two or three, but their goaltender was excellent as well.”

NOTES: Flames forward Connor Zary had an assist in 17:23 of ice time in his return from a two-game suspension for elbowing Vancouver Canucks defenseman Elias Pettersson on March 12. … Panarin leads the NHL with 14 points in March. He is the first undrafted NHL player to have five 30-goal seasons since Martin St. Louis, who had his seventh and final one in 2013-14. … The Rangers announced Tuesday that forward Arthur Kaliyev is out for the remainder of the season because of an upper-body injury.