The Blueshirts are back at it on their West Coast road trip, this time with a 9 p.m. puck drop making it slightly more bearable for the fans back home. After their big win in Vegas on Wednesday, the Rangers will look to extend their win streak to three which would be huge in their quest to turn things around. They’ll have a great opportunity to do so as they’re going up against a very injured Colorado team who is currently on their own losing streak of three games. The Rangers have run into Colorado once already this season, where they lost in a shootout on Garden Ice. Lots of hockey has been played since then as the Rangers will look to get revenge and grab a win from the Avalanche on their ice.
Couple of roster updates going into tonight’s game, the Rangers placed Ryan Carpenter on waivers yesterday as they seem to be happier with Jonny Brodzinski centering the fourth line. In 21 games played this season, Carpenter has been a -5 with just three points in a goal and two assists. Carpenter’s expertise in the face-off dot was highly coveted and at times, definitely valuable but at the end of the day, that’s about all he really brought to the table. Blais/Goodrow/Gauthier proved to be a fantastic fourth line and while Gerard Gallant continues to attempt Goodrow on the second line, Brodzinski is a perfectly good option there as well. This left Carpenter the odd man out and as the Rangers don’t want to carry more than 22 guys on their roster.
A couple other interesting names appeared on the NHL Waiver Wire yesterday, one of which a recent former Ranger. Kevin Rooney, who signed a two year deal, well over a million dollars per with Calgary in the off-season, joined Carpenter on waivers. This left many fans speculating on a potential return to New York as well as Larry Brooks who reminded us on Twitter just how highly regarded Rooney was up and down the organization. Frankly, we all know the deal with this team’s lack of cap space. It doesn’t matter if Kevin Rooney was the second coming of Mr. Rogers, the team can’t afford to dedicate that much of their cap hit to an at best fourth liner.
A much more affordable and equally as intriguing name that appeared on waivers is Colorado’s Martin Kaut. Kaut, was a 16th overall pick back in 2018, drafted out of the Czech league. Kaut has struggled to find his game at the NHL level, having only six points in 38 career games spanning across four seasons. Sometimes a change of scenery is all it takes for a guy to find his game and if I was running the Rangers, I would happily take a chance on the guy. Granted, we’re having enough trouble giving Vitaly Kravtsov consistent chances in the line-up so the Rangers probably aren’t in Kaut’s best interests. Nevertheless, he would be a great pick up for the Rangers, as he would any team.
At any rate, I wouldn’t expect any changes to the Rangers game tonight. Vitaly Kravtsov is likely expected to be a healthy scratch once again, leaving the lines the same as they were in Vegas:
Lafreniere - Zibanejad - Kakko
Panarin - Chytil - Goodrow
Kreider - Trocheck - Vesey
Blais - Brodzinski - Gauthier
Lindgren - Fox
Miller - Trouba
Hajek - Schneider
Putting Kakko and Lafreniere on the top line with Zibanejad was a crucial, albeit long overdue move. It can’t be overstated that the current success of the team, as well as the long term success, weighs heavily on the development and success of these young players. With all three of Lafreniere, Kakko and Chytil in the top six Wednesday night, all three of them found the back of the net. With consistent, trusted ice time, these three have such a high ceiling, it’s getting to be foolish giving ice time to older depth players over these young talents. Which brings us, once again, to Vitaly Kravtsov.
Listen, I am all for liking your guys but there is no reason for Barclay Goodrow to be playing his third hand position in the top six over Vitaly Kravtsov. We’ve been over this countless times, Barclay Goodrow is best used in a bottom-six role. He has looked GREAT as the fourth line center in between Blais and Gauthier, why is Gallant constantly asking for more out of these established role players?? It’s no secret that Artemi Panarin has taken Kravtsov under his wing since the start of training camp this season. I wonder if it gets to a point where Panarin, who is one of the 800 leaders of this team, goes to Gallant and either asks why he isn’t staying in the lineup or flat out says he wants him on his right wing. As much as I, along with all the other fans, wish we were a daily part of this team and knew every little detail, the fact is so much goes on that we don’t know about. Maybe the guys love Goodrow as much as Gallant does, maybe everyone is fine with that line up structure but the longer Kravtsov struggles to remain consistently in the line up go on, the more concerns with 74’s future in New York will arise.
As for the Avalanche, as I mentioned earlier, they are dealing with many injuries. Nathan MacKinnon, Valeri Nichushkin, Bowen Byram, Josh Manson, Gabriel Landeskog, Kurtis MacDermid, Darren Helm and Shane Bowers are all either on IR or LTIR. With that in mind, this isn’t the full team the Rangers saw at the beginning of the season. They should be more than capable of outplaying this team in both ends of the ice. While many of the Avs superstars are on the sidelines at the moment, Mikko Rantanen and Cale Makar are still there so it’s not going to be a complete walk in the park for New York. Expect old friend Alexandar Georgiev to go up against Shesterkin in net as the Rangers will look to continue with their offensive success against Vegas.
Chris Feldman
Comments