Regarding the Battle of the Hudson VII that resumes Monday night at the Garden with the Rangers up 2-1 and seeking to regain control of the series:

1. The shot off the first-period breakaway was just a bit outside the way that Ricky Vaughn’s pitches were before the rookie began wearing spectacles. And when two glorious opportunities on a late third-period power play went astray one right after the other, Artemi Panarin shook his head in frustration on the ice and then when he went to the bench for a change. His body language needed no translation.

Panarin has simplified his game. He has worked diligently to get back. He has avoided risk-reward plays through the neutral zone and at the line. Neither he nor linemates Vincent Trocheck and Vlad Tarasenko has been on for a goal-against.

But Panarin has not yet scored a goal. He has hit the net on only seven of 18 attempts. Of course we are talking about three games, but things can get late early in the playoffs. Individual statistics that are footnotes after victories tend to move higher up in the narrative following defeats.

“Bread likes to make those nice plays and get some jump and bounce in his legs on the power play and when things don’t go in for him, he gets a little frustrated,” head coach Gerard Gallant said on a full off-day for his team. “But I like the way he’s playing. He’s playing hard, he’s coming back in the D-zone.

“Obviously they want to get their points and that’s a big thing for those guys but right now for three games I think they’ve all played really well and know what it takes to win.”

Gallant said a major part of his job is communicating just that sentiment to his players, assuring them that there is more to the game than scoring. Trocheck has zeroes across his abbreviated stat line, but it sounds as if that is a conversation the coach does not need to have with No. 16.

“I think it’s just a matter of doing whatever it takes to win games,” Trocheck said. “The first couple of games there was a lot of scoring, we scored a lot of power-play goals, and when you have leads, it’s important to try and protect them, play smart hockey and not let the puck in your net.

“In a game where it’s tight like [Saturday], obviously you want to be the guy to be a hero and put the puck in the back of the net. It’s a tough game out there but of course you want to get on the board and contribute any way you can.

“But there are more ways than one to contribute to a win.”

2. Four years of Adam Fox and I had never seen anything like what the Norris contender did 9:05 into the second period of Game 3.

For when Timo Meier played the puck deep in the Rangers’ end after a teammate had touched it with a high stick, Fox crushed the Devils’ winger into the corner boards. This was not a polite tap on the whistle. This was a throwback to the days of serious hits on contested icings.

Fox has given what he has taken, probably even more, after taking a steady pounding a year ago. He has been first on the scene in goalmouth scrums. He has been more physical than ever.

“Not in my two years,” Gallant said when asked if he’d seen Fox play with this much physicality. “But teams go after top players a little bit, nothing real dirty, but they went after him a bit and that’s part of the playoffs.

“You have to stand up for yourself, you have to be physical but you’ve got to be disciplined. That’s the key.”

Want to catch a game? The Rangers schedule with links to buy tickets can be found here.

3. The Rangers went through a stretch of about 10 minutes in the first period during which they fell back into lamentable regular-season habits, overpassing while seeking to make the pretty, perfect play. Gallant thought the team had been influenced by playing to the crowd at the Garden despite vows not to do so.

“You come home, you’ve got the crowd going crazy and you try and make it a little bit cute once in a while and I thought that’s what we did,” he said. “Again, we didn’t overdo it but it’s just that there was a little bit of that in our game where the first two we didn’t see that.”

Trocheck was one of the culprits, eschewing a scoring opportunity from the right circle on a first-period power play to attempt a cross-ice feed at a difficult angle to Fox on the left. The pass failed to connect.

“In hindsight I would have liked to shoot the puck,” Trocheck said. “But my thought was that I saw [Akira] Schmid kind of come out a little far and I thought if I could get that puck to Foxy he’d have an easy empty net.

“We definitely overpassed a little bit too much and passed up some good looks. I think a lot of times you’re anticipating having no time and you think maybe that last pass is more of an open look if you’re able to get it to a guy, but I think, like we’ve been saying, on a rookie goalie, our first game at home, you’ve got to be looking to shoot the puck a little bit more.”