Rangers vs Blackhawks preview and live conversation

The New York Rangers will be going for their eighth win in a row at Madison Square Garden and their sixth win overall.  The Rangers are one point behind the Washington Capitals with two games in hand and they could be sitting in first place when the night is over. The Caps have lost two in a row and host the Columbus Blue Jackets tonight.

They will do it with their number on goalie on the sidelines as Igor Shesterkin has been played on injured reserve with a leg injury that is not as severe as originally believed.   The Rangers sent out a tweet with the most definitive time frame, just a week.

The Blackhawks sport a record of 8-12-2 and that’s quite an improvement over their start when they were winless in October and went 0-7-2 before getting their first win against Ottawa. Since winning only once in their first 12 games they have gone 7-3-0.

The biggest issue for the Blackhawks has been their offense.  They are averaging 2.14 goals per game, third fewest in the NHL.  They are allowing 3.18 goals per game, ninth worst in the NHL.  Their minus 21 goals differential is fourth worst in the league.

This season Patrick Kane is still their leading scorer with six goals and 19 points, but it’s been Alex DeBrincat who is the hottest Hawk.  He has eight goals in his last 11 games. Believe it or not, Jonathan Toews is looking for his first goal with nine assists in 22 games.  He missed the entire last season with an injury.

The Rangers have allowed only four goals in their last four games so Chicago has their work cut out for them.

Adam Fox gets to play against another top defenseman in Seth Jones after prevailing over Erik Karlsson and Brent Burns last night.  Ryan Strome will face his brother Dylan who has been rumored to be on the trade block.

This will be Artemi Panarin’s sixth game against the team that signed him in 2015.  He has scored three times and has five points in five games against his former team. Expect big things from him as he loves to excel against teams he used to play for.  Witness his seven goals and 14 points in nine games against Columbus.

On another note, Vitali Kravtsov added an assist in Traktor’s 4-1 win over Spartak today in KHL action. That gives him five goals and seven points in 10 games this season.

Projected lineups

Alexandar Georgiev has never played against the Blackhawks and will be appearing in two consecutive games for the second time this season.  This season he has a 2-1-1 record in five starts with a mediocre .867 Save Percentage and 3.89 Goals Against Average. He will need to improve on those numbers and fast.

Other than goal, the Rangers will be going with the same lineup that played the last four games. Morgan Barron remains with the team, called up from Hartford to replace Greg McKegg (COVID protocol).

NEW YORK RANGERS

20 Kreider – 93 Zibanejad – 24 Kakko
10 Panarin – 16 Strome – 29 Hunt
13 Lafrenière– 72 Chytil– 15 Gauthier
17 Rooney –  21 Goodrow– 75 Reaves

55 Lindgren – 23 Fox
79 Miller – 8 Trouba
12 Nemeth – 27 Lundkvist

40 Georgiev
32 Huska

CHICAGO BLACKHAWKS

38 Brandon Hagel – 19 Jonathan Toews – 88 Patrick Kane
12 Alex DeBrincat – 77 Kirby Dach – 17 Dylan Strome
8 Dominik Kubalik – 13 Henrik Borgstrom – 16 Jujhar Khaira
86 Mike Hardman – 36 Josiah Slavin – 22 Ryan Carpenter

56 Erik Gustafsson -4  Seth Jones
6 Jake McCabe – 82 Caleb Jones
48 Wyatt Kalynuk – 61 Riley Stillman

29 Marc-Andre Fleury
32 Kevin Lankinen

Marc-Andre Fleury is two wins away from 500 for his career and if he starts and wins the next two games against the Rangers, he will reach the milestone. Only Martin Brodeur and Patrick Roy have accomplished the feat in NHL history.

This is the first game between the teams since February 19, 2020 and the first game for the Blackhawks at MSG in almost three years.   In their last game in 2020, the Rangers won 6-3 in Chicago.  Eight players who suited up for the Blackhawks are still with the team. 10 Rangers remain from that squad.

How to watch and the live thread

It’s a late 8pm start due to a Knicks matinee.   The telecast will be on the MSG Network locally and ESPN+ nationally. The radio call will be on ESPN 98.7 FM.

As usual Blue Line  Station will be hosting its live in-game conversation using the comments feature below. We’ve had some issues with the comments refreshing and are working on that, so please bear with us. One workaround is to change how the comments sort from “newest” to “oldest” and back to “newest” again.

Join your fellow Ranger fans as we see how the Blueshirts deal with this injury setback.