Following the New York Rangers convincing 6-2 win over the Buffalo Sabres on Friday, February 16th, the team had a practice day and head coach David Quinn made several announcements.
Even though the final of Friday night’s contest was 6-2, it was a hard-earned victory that the New York Rangers earned through a convincing effort. It took a majority of the game for the Rangers to separate themselves on the scoreboard but played a truly cohesive and hard-nosed game that overwhelmed a fringe playoff team in Buffalo.
The victory came at a cost though in the form of a lower-body injury to defenseman Brady Skjei. The Minnesota native left the game with 8:57 to go in the second period and did not return. However, the defenseman announced that he was healthy enough to play in Sunday’s contest against the Pittsburgh Penguins.
The defenseman was wearing a knee brace at the practice arena in Pittsburgh on Saturday in a video that Colin Stephenson of Newsday posted on Twitter.
Killing time before practice in Pittsburgh. pic.twitter.com/FD5rnYiPlS
— Colin Stephenson (@ColinSNewsday) February 16, 2019
In addition to Skjei announcing he was healthy enough to play, Rangers head coach David Quinn also announced that defenseman Fredrik Claesson was ready to return to the lineup following an extended stint on the injured reserve list. The Swede had not played since January 12th against the New York Islanders when he took a nasty spill into the boards.
This currently gives the Rangers eight defensemen on the roster leaving open the possibility of another seven defensemen and 11 forwards lineup configuration for the game against Pittsburgh. After Skjei left the game with a lower-body injury, Brendan Smith, who was playing forward at the time, was moved back to the blue line as a replacement.
DQ said he doesn’t know if Brady Skjei is good to go for tomorrow. But Freddie Claesson is cleared. Not sure if Chytil will be back in, either. Decisions still to be made.
— Colin Stephenson (@ColinSNewsday) February 16, 2019
Although Skjei felt he was ready to play, Quinn pumped the breaks on the former Minnesota Golden Gopher’s announcement and said he did not make a final lineup decision yet.
There is also the matter of 19-year-old center Filip Chytil who was healthy scratched for the game against the Sabres on Friday. The team’s head coach said that the Czech’s play was slipping as of late as the reason for being healthy scratched.
With so many lineup choices to be made prior to the game on Sunday, there is a wide range of possibilities for the game against Pittsburgh.
It could be as simple as sliding Claesson in for Skjei and sticking with what worked against Buffalo or Skjei could be good to go and Claesson replaces someone else.
We’ll have an appropriate update if Quinn makes any announcements prior to game time.