The New York Ranger take on the the Minnesota Wild in Mats Zuccarello’s return to New York. He’ll be facing his old friend, Henrik Lundqvist. Mika Zibanejad won’t play, but provided some insight into his injury.
Some interesting news came out of the pre-game practice for the Rangers. First, Henrik Lundqvist will be in net for the Blueshirts and will be looking to prevent h is close friend from scoring. Lundqvist was in tears after Zuccarello was traded last February.
Zuccarello admitted that it “will be a special game” after the Wild morning skate. This afternoon, Lundqvist spoke about the Norwegian and what it will take to keep the Rangers on a winning track.
“The trust factor is big - for us to believe in each other in the room here - and we talked about it during the game in Montreal when things were going a little tough. Just trust each other.”
— New York Rangers (@NYRangers) November 25, 2019
Henrik on sustaining momentum, plus his thoughts on Zucc’s return to @TheGarden. ⬇️ pic.twitter.com/fZE6LN1q3h
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Greg McKegg is out with a lower body injury after an awkward collision in the Montreal game. He will be replaced by Boo Nieves who will center the fourth line with Micheal Haley who has found a new lease on his NHL lilfe.
Mika’s injury
What’s the expression? We call BS? Well we do when it comes to the description of Mika Zibanejad’s injury as a “neck injury.,” Our own Curtis Jetter called it in his 21 thoughts story yesterday, it must be a concussion.
Zibanjead spoke at length to reporters after practice and while he didn’t come out and say he had a concussion, his evasive answers were specific enough to know that is what he has been recovering from. Here is Zibanejad’s complete interview. Watch it and let me know what you think.
“You guys miss me? 😏”
— New York Rangers (@NYRangers) November 25, 2019
Mika on getting closer and closer to a return: pic.twitter.com/ZFAVEIVsg0
The key point is at 1:22 into the interview when he is asked point blank what the injury was. His answer? “I won’t go into details. You guys can figure it out, it was an upper body I’m not going to go into more details than that. ” The rest of his answers were clearly about the challenge of recovering from a concussion.
Why the team is not more forthright about the nature of an injury is mystifying. Maybe he also sustained a whiplash injury to his neck, but the lack of information has been a disservice to the fans. Zibanejad has had five concussions in his career with the last coming in November 2017 when he was out of action about a month.
The bottom line is that once he returns, every time Zibanejad sustains a high hit, it will cause Ranger fans to hold their breath and cross their fingers.
The good news is that Zibanejad is hoping to return on Wednesday against the Carolina Hurricanes.
As for the Wild, Devan Dubnyk is away from the team for personal reasons so they should start Alex Stalock. Stalock is 5-3-1 on the season with a 2.79 GAA and a .908 save percentage. Stalock lost in his only appearance against the Rangers..
Projected starting lineups
New York Rangers
10 Panarin – 16 Strome – 17 Fast
20 Kreider – 72 Chytil – 89 Buchnevich
48 Lemieux – 21 Howden – 24 Kakko
42 Smith – 15 Nieves – 38 Haley
76 Skjei – 8 Trouba
55 Lindgren – 23 Fox
25 Hajek – 77 DeAngelo
30 Lundqvist
40 Georgiev
Minnesota Wild
16 Jason Zucker – 12 Eric Staal – 36 Mats Zuccarello
11 Zach Parise – 9 Mikku Koivu – 22 Kevin Fiala
18 Jordan Greenway – 14 Joel Eriksson Ek – 19 Luke Kunin
6 Ryan Donato – 49 Victor Rask – 38 Ryan Hartman
20 Ryan Suter – 46 Jared Spurgeon
25 Jonas Brodin – 24Matt Dumba
21 Carson Soucy – Brad 77 Hunt
32 Alex Stalock
31 Kaapo Kahkonen
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The live thread is open….now. The live thread Saturday was great. It went from utter dispair to total joy.