Doomed to one game obscurity

As we pass the time in self quarantine we are looking for interesting topics concerning the New York Rangers.   Here we go with another one.  Obscure facts about players who only played one game as a New York Ranger.

First, a New York Rangers trivia question. What do Daniel Catenacci, Jeremy Williams and Brandon Halverson have in common?   Answer:  They are the three Rangers who played only one game for the Blueshirts in this decade.

Of the three, Jeremy Williams played all of 3:43 in his only appearance on October 24, 2010.  He had six shifts in a 3-1 win over the Devils at the Garden.  Williams had been signed as a free agent the previous summer after seeing action in 31 games over four season for Toronto.  He was recalled from Hartford when Brandon Prust was cut near the eye.

His one game with the Blueshirts didn’t do anything for his career as he left for Europe the following season.  The 36-year old is still playing, most recently for the Straubing Tigers of the  Deutsche Eishockey Liga  (DEL).

If playing one game for the Rangers is a ticket to hockey in Europe, it applies to center Dan Catenacci. Catenacci had been a Buffalo draft pick who the Rangers acquired in a trade for Mat Bodie.  On January 19, 2018 he was recalled from Hartford and played in one game, a 3-1 loss in  Colorado.  Catenacci played 11:03, was minus one, had one hit and blocked one shot.

Since that brief appearance in the NHL, Catenacci has been playing for HC Bolzano in the Erste Bank Eishockey Liga (EBEL), the Austrian hockey league.

One thing worth nothing about Catenacci.  When he was promoted from Hartford, he came with a young defenseman named Tony DeAngelo.   Unlike Catenacci, DeAngelo has never looked back and has stuck in the NHL ever since.  Also, for you trivia buffs, it was Lias Andersson who was Hartford-bound in this transaction.

A week before the trade deadline in February 2018, Brandon Halverson made his debut for the New York Rangers.  He came in to relieve Henrik Lundqvist with the Rangers losing 5-1 in Ottawa to the Senators.   He gave up one goal to Magnus Paajarvi in 13 minutes of ice time.

His Ranger career ended with a 4.78 goals against average and a .833 save percentage.  Why was he even with the team?  Alexandar Georgiev had the flu.

Halverson is still playing hockey and was recently described as the “backbone” of the Norfolk Admirals of the ECHL, where he landed after the Blueshirts failed to make him a qualifying offer last summer.