We’re right back at it as the Rangers host another Western Canadian team at the World’s Most Famous, this time in the form of the Vancouver Canucks. The Canucks have been quite a story around the league this season and not for particularly good reasons. This will be the first time the Rangers get a taste of the dumpster fire that has been the Canucks this season, and will do so in their second game without their captain, who has since been traded in a blockbuster deal. Right before the All-Star game in typical Lou Lamourillo fashion, the Islanders acquired Bo Horvat from the Canucks in exchange for Anthony Beauvillier, Aaty Raty and a conditional first round pick. This is likely the first of several deals involving the Canucks as they are among the bottom of the leagues standings making them big sellers at this year's trade deadline. The Horvat deal, just coming a week or so after the organization fired Head Coach Bruce Boudreau.
The Canucks are 20-26-4 on the season which certainly isn’t good but given the direction of this franchise, is even worse when you consider they aren’t necessarily front runners in the Connor Bedard sweepstakes. There are currently six teams with worse records than the Canucks but at the same time, have their internal affairs sorted out fairly well. The Canucks are one of the teams in this league that are really struggling to find their identity. Throughout the last couple years, they’re a team that has tried to compete but failed and have put off committing to a rebuild entirely. Even now where they have made it clear that they’re going to be sellers, everyone except for a select few players are available for trade, they’re still making questionable front office decisions and don’t really have a good idea of what the future of this team is going to look like.
With all that in mind, the Canucks are a bit of a tough team to read. By all means, the Rangers should be able to go into this one and take control of the game early but at the same time, we don’t know what kind of team we’re going to get from Vancouver one night to the next. The Canucks are in the midst of their tri-state road trip as they are coming off an overtime loss to the Devils Monday Night and will head to Long Island tomorrow. Even just looking at the game notes from their last outing, they’re getting contributions from very inconsistent players as almost all of their goals in that game came from guys who, on average, had one goal on the season going into the game. One of which, from our former pal Phil Di Giuseppe for his first of the season in his second game of the year.
One other big piece of news on Vancouver’s end is that starting goaltender Thatcher Demko was a participant in yesterday’s practice. Demko has been out with a leg injury since the beginning of December and could be on the brink of returning. Whether or not that return will come tonight will remain to be seen as Spencer Martin and Collin Delia have been handling the workload in the meantime. Neither of which have put up particularly strong numbers but at the same time, this isn’t a particularly great team playing in front of them. They have one of the worst goals against averages in the league making it all the more of an opportunity for the Rangers to have a strong, offensive night.
On the Rangers end, I wouldn’t expect much to change from the last game aside from in net. Igor Shesterkin will likely return after having Monday off but as far as the lines go, I’d expect much of the same:
Panarin - Zibanejad - Vesey
Kreider - Trocheck - Goodrow
Lafreniere - Chytil - Kakko
Cuylle - Leschyshyn - Blais
Lindgren - Fox
Miller - Trouba
Harpur - Schneider
Gauthier and Kravtsov remain the extras for the third and fourth line in practice but given Blais’ efforts in the last game, I wouldn’t expect Gallant to change much. The Rangers will look to build some momentum off their win on Monday Night and as long as they show up to play, shouldn’t have much of an issue doing so. All eyes will continue to be on Filip Chytil and his linemates as he will look to ride his hot streak as he continues turning heads around the league with the career year he is having. Amidst all the chaos in Vancouver, they have made it a point to note that Elias Pettersson, Quinn Hughes and newly extended Andrei Kuzmenko are the pieces they are looking to build around and will additionally be the names to look out for on Vancouver's end. Pettersson has six points in his last five as Kuzmenko and Hughes lead the team in goals and assists in that same stretch.
I wouldn’t expect as passionate of a game from either side as we saw on Monday but you never can tell how these games are going to go. Regardless, expect the Rangers to ride that high from Monday and hopefully will look to do so with more of an offensively dominant showing.
Chris Feldman
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