Blue Line Station
Fansided

Game Preview: New York Rangers look to halt skid in Buffalo

By Jason Katinas

NEW YORK, NEW YORK - SEPTEMBER 18: Nathan Bastian #42 of the New Jersey Devils sends a shot wide of Alexandar Georgiev #40 of the New York Rangers during the first period at Madison Square Garden on September 18, 2019 in New York City. (Photo by Bruce Bennett/Getty Images)
NEW YORK, NEW YORK - SEPTEMBER 18: Nathan Bastian #42 of the New Jersey Devils sends a shot wide of Alexandar Georgiev #40 of the New York Rangers during the first period at Madison Square Garden on September 18, 2019 in New York City. (Photo by Bruce Bennett/Getty Images) /
facebooktwitterreddit
Prev
2 of 4
Next
new york rangers
Filip Chytil #72 of the New York Rangers y. (Photo by Bruce Bennett/Getty Images) /

Submitted for your approval, the New York Rangers have entered the Twilight Zone

Depending on your choice of entertainment, in comparison to last season, this New York Rangers team has entered either the Twilight Zone, Superman’s Bizarro World or Star Trek’s mirror universe. The team is performing in a way that is nearly directly opposite to its performance last season. in five games this season, the Rangers are a positive possession team (53.1% Corsi For) with good depth production (11 points from bottom six forwards) that is suffering from below average goaltending (.893% save percentage), a poorly performing top six (14 points) and a lack of production from the back end (eight points).

What this has provided though is much the same in terms of results. A team that is both fun and extremely frustrating to watch. Looking ahead, this team has much promise and the remainder of the division should take note. Assuming the team continues on its current path and when the goaltending dusts off its rust and the stars start playing like stars, this will be a very dangerous team. They will though need to first suffer through the injury bug.

Filip Chytil was injured in the last game and will not be in tonight’s line-up and will be out for the foreseeable future.. Without an official announcement, expectations are for Brett Howden to fill in at third line center. This will leave either Kevin Rooney or Colin Blackwell to slide over into the fourth line center role with either Brendan Lemieux or Julien Gauthier getting back into the line up.

No other changes to the line-up are expected, but it would not be surprising to see additional line shuffling as Coach Quinn looks to spark the top six. The players know they need to step up, the only question is when we will see that occur.

Alexandar Georgiev gets the call in net.

Home/Analysis