New York Rangers News, Rumors and Notes: The Injury Bug Has Hit

All the latest news, rumors, rumblings and notes surrounding the New York Rangers, all in one place!

The New York Rangers fell to the Tampa Bay Lightning at home on Monday night by a score of 3-2. The team played well for the most part, but Antti Raanta only faced 16 shots in the contest and was never able to get a feel for the puck.
The biggest problem with the loss was that it was yet another home loss. The Rangers have lost four straight games at the Garden in regulation, dropping their home record to 19-15-2 this season. Larry Brooks of the New York Post wrote more about this and the game itself back on Monday night.
With the way the Rangers are losing on home ice, maybe holding onto the top Wild Card position is a good thing for the team, as it would mean they would play game seven of any series, if neccesary, on the road. Justin Tasch of the Daily News looked into this a bit more.
Anyway, we are now through 70 games on the year, and our very own Brandon Cohen wrote about some thoughts he has with only 12 regular season games remaining.

With all the injuries the Rangers have had to deal with over the last couple of weeks, adding Henrik Lundqvist to the list of ailing players hurts the Rangers a bit, but as Sean Hartnett of CBS New York wrote about, Antti Raanta will become an x-factor for the Rangers going forward.
Something interesting to note on the goaltending subject is that the Rangers sent Magnus Hellberg back to the AHL on Tuesday. Could this mean that Henrik Lundqvist will be ready to at least be avaliable in a backup role come Friday? I’m not sure, but it sure is starting to look that way.
If you are the Rangers, though, their is no point in rushing back Lundqvist. The Rangers are safely in a Wild Card slot and are most likely going to lock up a playoff spot within the next two weeks.
Another player that could return by the end of the week is winger Jesper Fast, who the team desperately misses on the penalty kill. Vigneault said he needs to see how he does in practice on Wednesday (today) before he makes that call.

In his place, surprisingly, Tanner Glass has been playing really well for the Rangers of late. He even posted a 55% even strength CF% in Monday night’s game, although he was very ineffective.

At the end of the day, if Glass is not throwing the body and playing with energy, he is pretty much useless in the lineup, even with those possesion numbers. If Glass can continue to do those two things, all while staying in the front of the net at all times on offense, he would be a solid addition to this lineup. Once Fast is back, though, he should come out of the lineup.