RALEIGH, N.C. — Gerard Gallant said he thought the Rangers played their best hockey of the year Wednesday in their 2-1 overtime loss to the Hurricanes in Game 1 of their second-round playoff series.

The Rangers head coach and the rest of the team did acknowledge there were mistakes and that they sat back at the most critical point in the game. That allowed Hurricanes center Sebastian Aho to score the game-tying goal with 2:23 left in regulation before Ian Cole won it in overtime. The Rangers’ takeaways from Game 1, however, were largely positive despite the loss.

“If we can play that game again [in Game 2 on Friday], I think we’ll win,” Gallant said.

Still, it wasn’t enough to stifle the Hurricanes, and the Rangers trail 1-0 in the series, just as they did in Round 1 against the Penguins. That’s the other silver lining for the Rangers: They have been here before.

The Rangers evened their first-round series with Pittsburgh after a crushing 4-3 loss in triple overtime in Game 1, which seemed to be a much more deflating defeat than Wednesday’s. And even after losing Games 3 and 4 to the Penguins, the Rangers rallied from a 3-1 series deficit and won Game 7 in overtime to advance.

The same aspects of the Rangers’ game continue to get in the way of their success. From the lengthy stretches without the puck, which is a byproduct of getting away from what makes them effective, to their tendency to hold the lead instead of building on it, the Rangers keep running into the same issues that will make it difficult to win against playoff-level competition.

“The fact that we played three do-or-die games, I think as a group really, we talk about resiliency and character and all that stuff,” Ryan Strome said. “But I think sometimes when you feel that, not just saying that, [it] really means something. This is a different beast, this [Carolina] team, obviously. They provide a different challenge. But at the same time, when we’re good, we’re worrying about our game. I think we just got to come out in Game 2 with a good effort.

“We’ve been in this situation before, we were down 1-0 in an overtime loss last series. I think there’s a lot of good things we did, I thought the first 40-50 minutes were really good hockey. So we just got to watch the video, get back to that and try to find a way to get that next one.

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“I think sometimes sitting on that one-goal lead, we need someone to make a play to get that to 2-0. I think it maybe changes a little bit.”

Gallant noted that the Rangers were naturally very disappointed with the loss, but he said he believes his players saw a major difference in their ability to compete with the Hurricanes compared to the regular season.

It’s true the Rangers did look as if they could hang with the Hurricanes for the first time in quite a while. It’s also true that it still wasn’t enough, and they’ll have to play even better to even this series.

“I think if you come back 3-1 against a good team like [the Penguins], you have to win three in a row and you do the job, you gotta bring that confidence to other series,” Ryan Reaves said. “You got to understand that what we just did, you can do in any series against any team. At any point in the game, the game’s not over. I think playing that series gives us confidence for that. Just things we’ve done throughout the season. We tied for first, second, whatever it was, in comeback wins all season.

“We know how to play, we know how to come back, we know how to hold leads — except for [Wednesday] night — but we learn and we move on.”