Rangers allow two goals to John Tavares, fall to Maple Leafs for third straight loss

Twelve games are all that remain in the Rangers’ regular season. That’s not much time for them to find a way to beat out the rest of the pack and snatch the last playoff spot in the Eastern Conference.

But if they can’t find a way to reverse course from the way things are going now, it’s not going to happen.

For the second time in two nights, the Rangers lost a game they had to win against a team playing on the second night of a back-to-back. The Maple Leafs got two goals from former Islander John Tavares and dealt the Rangers a crushing 4-3 loss, their third on this four-game homestand.

“We knew how big the game was and just weren’t able to find a way,’’ center Sam Carrick said. “[But] there’s still a lot of belief in this room that we can find a way here to squeak in. And that’s not changing.’’

But their own loss wasn’t the only thing that went badly for the Rangers (33-31-6, 72 points) on Thursday night. They also got no help on the out-of-town scoreboard.

Montreal, which entered Thursday one point ahead of the Rangers for the second wild-card spot in the Eastern Conference, lost to the Islanders, 4-3, in overtime. That result meant both the Canadiens and Islanders gained ground on the Rangers. Montreal (33-27-8, 74 points) moved two points ahead of the Rangers and the Islanders (32-28-8) moved even by collecting their 72nd point.

Even Columbus, which lost to Florida in overtime, 1-0, gained ground on the Rangers. The Blue Jackets have 71 points.

The Rangers, who are 2-5-2 in their last nine games, also have two fewer games remaining than the other teams in the hunt, which doesn’t help.

If there was any consolation for the Rangers, at least they could say they played better than they did during Tuesday’s 2-1 loss to Calgary, which also was playing on the second night of a back-to-back. The Rangers were outshot 35-13 on Tuesday, but on Thursday, they had a 30-28 advantage.

“I thought our effort was there,” defenseman Will Borgen said, “but just a couple of lapses turned into pucks in the back of our net.”

Borgen was involved in an interesting strategy by coach Peter Laviolette, who mixed and matched his top four defensemen, playing Borgen and his usual partner, K’Andre Miller, together in some situations and then playing Miller and Adam Fox together in some situations.

When Fox and Miller were together, Borgen played with Carson Soucy, a former partner of his in Seattle years ago. Soucy returned to the lineup after having been a healthy scratch the previous three games.

Laviolette explained that he was trying to play Fox and Miller together when the Rangers had an offensive zone faceoff, and then Miller and Borgen together on defensive zone draws.

“It’s fine. I’m comfortable playing with any one of those guys,’’ Borgen said. “Foxy takes me off for offensive zone faceoffs, and that makes sense to me.’’

The Rangers trailed 4-2 at the start of the final period before Chris Kreider deflected a shot by Artemi Panarin past goalie Anthony Stolarz (27 saves) with 34.7 seconds remaining.

Miller and Fox were on for the Maple Leafs’ opening goal, a one-timer by Tavares at 12:30 of the first period. Tavares took a drop pass from Jake McCabe at the top of the slot and blasted it past Igor Shesterkin (24 saves) for his 28th goal of the season.

Borgen tied it with 47.9 seconds left in the period on a wrist shot through traffic from just above the right circle. But the euphoria in the building didn’t last long, as McCabe fired a shot from the left point that was tipped in by Bobby McMann with 9.6 seconds left. Miller and Borgen were on for that one.

Panarin scored his eighth goal in 11 games off a juicy rebound from a shot by Vincent Trocheck to tie it at 2 at 1:22 of the second period. But Tavares scored on a big rebound of his own to put the Leafs back in front at 4:16.

Toronto’s Matthew Knies scored from the top of the slot at 14:26 after taking a pass from William Nylander from behind the net. Nylander collected the puck on the left-wing boards after Miller passed it to Fox and it got past him.

By Colin Stephenson

colin.stephenson@newsday.comColinSNewsday

Colin Stephenson covers the Rangers for Newsday. He has spent more than two decades covering the NHL and just about every sports team in the New York metropolitan area.