New York Rangers: Drop the damn puck!
The New York Rangers are about to dive into the first “regular” NHL hockey season in two years. A full 82 games is slated, although with the Olympic break pausing play for a few weeks in February, the season still will not be completely normal. So what can be expected from the Broadway Blueshirts as the 2021-22 opens in Washington on Wednesday night?
Preseason Notes
Before looking ahead, let’s take a quick look at what we saw during the six preseason games. Let’s not put too much stock in the 4-2 record, although the results will certainly help to build confidence in the team. Rather let’s pick out some bits and pieces from the six games that were interesting and hopefully a harbinger of things to come.
First off, K’Andre Miller. Last year as a rookie, you very rarely, if ever, saw the young man engage in any post whistle shenanigans. Sure he would grab a guy in the scrum and hold tight until things calmed down but you never saw him use his 6′ 4″, 220-pound frame to his advantage. That seemed to change just a bit in the preseason.
One particular instance was in the first game against Boston, where Miller was more than willing to mix it up with a Bruin who was agitating just a bit too much after the whistle. I remember thinking that this was a whole new thing for Miller as it was happening. Then the camera angle changed to a wider shot of the ice…..and there was Ryan Reaves…. just making sure everything was staying under control.
It was only the second preseason game, but if you watched closely, you could already see the effect that one Mr. Reaves was having on this Ranger team. In the final exhibition game against the Islanders, Miller stepped in and pulled big Ross Johnson away from a skirmish, possibly forgetting that Reeves wasn’t playing, but either way, he stood tall.
Kaapo Kakko just looks a hell of a lot bigger. Expect big things from him this year.
The Ryan Strome decision this spring is going to be a really tough one for Chris Drury. Strome makes a dynamic partner for Artemi Panarin, and with Kakko on the second unit with them, they should be very exciting to watch.
Panarin of course remains worth the price of admission.
Mika Zibanejad looks like he is ready to be the old Mika right from the get go. As this article is being written, the Rangers just upped ZBJ for eight years. Putting aside the fact that he is worth every penny, what is even better about the deal is that it keeps Jack Eichel from being any part of future conversations. Amen.
Adam Fox has already quieted any chatter about being undeserving of the Norris, he is a stud, plain and simple.
The back end looks good with the addition of Jared Tinordi and Patrick Nemeth providing a level of grit the Rangers haven’t had on the defensive side in quite a long time.
Finally, Sammy Blais. If you are not excited about what you saw from him this preseason you just weren’t watching. The trade of Pavel Buchnevich may have been tough on Ranger fans when it happened, but with the way Blais has played so far, the sting has been taken away very quickly.
What to Expect from the New York Rangers
The Playoffs. Plain and simple. The rebuild is over, the team has been transformed.
The 2021-22 Rangers are a much more balanced team hitting the ice. They are a team loaded with talent, youth and toughness. It is recipe for success in today’s NHL.
No more turning the other cheek and playing whistle to whistle the way Alain Vingeault preached. No more desperately looking for toughness and swagger on a team that just didn’t feel comfortable portraying that in any way shape or form.
This is a team re-built after the debacle that ended the season last year. This is a team lead by a coach who wants talent to be talent, and brute force to be on display when it needs to be.
Gerard Gallant is also a coach who is known to leave his lines in place, something most Ranger fans should be very happy about. Let the lines learn and grow through good games and bad, it can only help them in the long run.
A really good indication as to how Gallant will run this team was very clear in the last exhibition game against the Islanders. Gallant sat his top players. Chris Kreider, Panarin and ZBJ had the night off. Gallant put the kids front and center. He let them be the players that he knows they can be and they delivered. Kakko was a beast, Laffy a joy to watch and Filip Chytil broke out. It may not have been coaching genius, but it was pretty damn smart.
Predictions for the Metropolitan Division
My god this painful to write, but the Islanders should win the division. If the Fishsticks don’t completely fall apart playing their first 13 games away from home they are the team to beat.
The Carolina Hurricanes are a really trendy pick. But they lost their top defenseman and now will be relying on Brady Skjei and Tony D’Angelo to carry the load on the blueline. Rangers fans have seen this movie before, and it was a disaster.
The Rangers should make the playoffs. The top two lines are as good as any in the league so long as Alexis Lafrenière and Kaapo Kakko hold up their end of the bargain. No reason to think they shouldn’t. They key will be Chytil. If he can anchor that third line and be the type of player he was in that last preseason game, the New York Rangers will be REALLY GOOD.
Look for the Rangers to make the Stanley Cup Tournament finishing somewhere between second and fourth in the Metropolitan.
Metropolitan Division
- Islanders
- Rangers
- Hurricanes
- Capitals
- Penguins
- Devils
- Philadelphia
- Columbus
Let’s Go Rangers!
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