The New York Rangers are in the city of music as they return to the States, following the Canada leg of their road trip to take on the Nashville Predators. Nashville is 1-2 through their first three games of the season, most recently, falling to the Kings 2-1. Nashville’s in a tough spot going into this season as they are on the brink of nearing the end of their years as contenders and headed towards a potential rebuild. With New York’s situation being almost flipped, making the transition from rebuild to contender, this will be a good test for this Rangers team to get another two points and start building a win streak.
The Rangers will still be without Kaapo Kakko and likely Ryan Strome for tonight’s outing, which may lead to some interesting line combinations. The Rangers moved Artemi Panarin up to the first line with Zibanejad in the back half of Monday night’s game in attempts to get both players going. At first glance from Rangers practice yesterday, it will appear we may get that line going into tonight’s game as well. When two of your top six forwards are out, might as well try and stack the top line and hope for the best around the rest of the line up.
With Panarin on the wing with Kreider between Zibanejad, Lafreniere moves down to the second line with Chytil and presumably one of Barclay Goodrow or Sammy Blais. The fourth line essentially becomes the third and it appears two of Gauthier, McKegg and Barron will fill out the fourth line. Lines at practice yesterday per Vince Mercogliano looked as follow:
Panarin - Zibanejad - Kreider
Lafreniere - Chytil - Blais
Hunt - Rooney - Goodrow
Gauthier/Barron/McKegg/Reaves
Lindgren - Fox
Miller - Trouba
Nemeth - Lundkvist
Tinordi - Hajek
Larry Brooks had also reported that Hajek was taking reps with Partik Nemeth yesterday, meaning the nightmare of sitting Lundkvist to get Hajek in the line up may be a possibility. You also have to wonder what the sense of Hunt being on the third line leaving Gauthier to possibly play on his off hand on the fourth line could be. Goodrow can play either side, why not put him on the left side on the third line, even if it means Ryan Reaves playing on the third line? It makes the most sense to let the kids (Barron and Gauthier) run the third line with Goodrow, leaving Hunt on the fourth line with Rooney and Reaves, business as usual. Unless the plan is to leave Gauthier out and have Barron play the left side or potentially swap with McKegg throughout the night between center and wing.
Regardless, we’re certainly missing Strome and Kakko as we're in for a very interesting line up tonight that’s extremely first line heavy. If the Rangers want Hajek to get in there, so much so that they’re considering taking Lundkvist out, I would almost rather they just roll seven defenseman or try Hajek at wing. Expect Shesterkin to get his third consecutive start as he absolutely carried the team to a win and had plenty of time to rest and recover from Monday night’s win. He will likely be up against Jusse Saros, who enters his first season as THE goalie in Nashville as Pekka Rinne has retired.
Overall, Nashville is certainly a team with some sneaky weapons and the Rangers absolutely shouldn't take them lightly. Testing Saros will be critical and staying out of the box should certainly be a focus. While it's still early, Nashville is currently 12th in the league on the power play and fifth in face offs. The Rangers, being 24th on the power play and 30th in face offs... just two spots away from dead last. Zibanejad, Chytil and the rest of the Rangers players who are taking draws need to buckle down and start finding a way to win them. It's going to be extremely difficult to win this game if Nashville wins every face off and gains the upper hand on puck possession. Either way, this should be a good test for the Rangers and an overall exciting game in the always rowdy, Bridgestone Arena.
Chris Feldman
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