NEW YORK - Forty minutes into the game, it couldn’t get much worse, but then it started to get better.

After two listless periods - and a 4-0 deficit - coach Tom Renney started switching the lines up. With a scoring threat of the ice every shift, the Rangers rose from the dead and almost made an improbable comeback, but fell short to the Ottawa Senators, 6-4.

“Maybe we learned a valuable lesson tonight,” thought Renney. “After all the rhetoric and what you do with the staff, maybe showing the resolve in the third period, the will to get yourself back in the game and avoid being embarrassed is the [lesson] we can conclude.”

It’s quite possible the Rangers showed some heart in this game, but at the same time, the first two periods showed that Renney’s tirade on Tuesday had little effect.

The coach called the first period “a chess match” since each team was feeling out each other. Only a score by Patrick Eaves over Kevin Weekes’ shoulder at 10:31 gave the Senators the edge.

Yet, it all fell apart in the second as Ottawa was able to bombard Weekes - who was giving Henrik Lindquist a much needed break - for three goals in the first 12:30 of the period.

“I thought after that first goal we really struggled,” Renney said. “ We were playing a game that was too tentative after that and then we became spectators.”

Renney called a time out and relieved Weekes [23 saves] with Lundqvist. During the short break he was animated on the bench as he gave orders to his team.

It seemed to work as they held the Senators shotless for the last 7 ½ minutes of the period. Then Renney started to mix up the lines and things changed in the third.

Although Daniel Alfredsson tallied a fifth goal for Ottawa, which gave Lundqvist the loss, a little over a minute into the third the Rangers played with a passion that was not present the first 40 minutes.

“Coach was saying we had nothing to lose, so let’s try something,” Jaromir Jagr said. “He took all four lines so we can score goals and that’s what happened.

Petr Prucha got the Rangers on the board at 3:29 followed by Jason Ward less than a minute later. After Marcel Hossa made it 5-3 with over 13 minutes left, the Garden crowd was abuzz.

“It spread the offensive out over three or four lines,” said Blair Betts, who made it 5-4 at 10:39. “We had a chance if they didn’t get that fifth one to win the game.”

The Rangers actually had a chance to tie it with 2:35 left. Chris Phillips shot the puck over the glass in his zone, which is a penalty, but none was called.

“You thought I was upset the other night,” Renney said. “I've been given details why it was called the way it was. Our replay of the play clearly, clearly suggests otherwise.

“If we score on the power play, and of course I'm the optimist that we're going to, we get a point at least and then we get through overtime ... and we've been pretty good in shootouts.”

But it was not meant to be and an empty netter by Dany Heatley with less than a minute left made the four goal third, moot.

“To have a chance to come back and win a game when you were down 5-0, it would have been special,” said Brendan Shanahan. “But it just gets chalked up as a loss.”

Notes: Jagr has an assist on Prucha’s goal to give him a nine game home point scoring streak…Jed Ortmeyer had two assists, the first two in almost a year…The Rangers play Boston on Saturday at 2:00 p.m.