Live conversation for another almost must win Game 2

Here we go again.  The Rangers play a game that is not a “must win” but is pretty close.  They wanted to come out of Raleigh with one win and they came pretty close, but lost in heartbreaking fashion.  How they recover from that devastating blown lead and overtime loss will tell us a lot about the team.  How the Hurricanes build on that thrilling win will be a huge storyline.

There should be no changes to the lineups with the injury situation remaining the same for both teams.  Ryan Lindgren will play, despite what has been described as a high ankle sprain.  It took him out of the game for a chunk of time in the first period, but he was able to return.

The key question is whether the Rangers can control this game the way that they were able to stymie the Hurricanes’ for two periods on Wednesday.  The Blueshirts’ prevent offense didn’t help them at all in that game along with their inability to score on several golden opportunities.   We will see if it was a lackluster start by Carolina or was a perfect structure by the Rangers that resulted in two of the best periods played by the Blueshirts this season.  It’s probably a little bit of both.

We cannot expect the Hurricanes to come out flat so the Rangers have to be at their best.  Stay tuned.

Projected lineups

NEW YORK RANGERS

20 Kreider – 93 Zibanejad – 77 Vatrano
10 Panarin – 16 Strome – 18 Copp
13 Lafreniere -72 Chytil – 24 Kakko
64 Motte  – 17 Rooney – 75 Reaves

55 Lindgren  – 23 Fox
79 Miller – 8  Trouba
61 Braun – 54  Schneider

31 Shesterkin
40  Georgiev

CAROLINA HURRICANES

37 Andrei Svechnikov – 20 Sebastian Aho – 24 Seth Jarvis
13 Max Domi – 16 Vincent Trocheck – 86 Teuvo Teravainen
21 Nino Niederreiter — 11 Jordan Staal – 71 Jesper Fast
78 Steven Lorentz – 82 Jesperi Kotkaniemi – 88 Martin Necas

74 Jaccob Slavin – 77 Tony DeAngelo
76 Brady Skjei – 22 Brett Pesce
7 Brendan Smith – 28 Ian Cole

32 Antti Raanta
52 Pyotr Kochetkov

How to watch and the live conversation

Note that gametime is 8pm and there will be no local options for watching as all games from now on will be on national television.  Tonight’s game and the first four of the series will be on ESPN with the livestream on ESPN+.

MSG Network will be providing pre-game coverage beginning at 7:30pm and will have live postgame coverage while ESPN will go right to the Oilers-Flames game.

Why the late start?  Because the PGA Championship is on ESPN and their coverage doesn’t end until 8pm.  The NHL’s television ratings are up because of their new TV partners, but you can see that the networks are determining the schedule in this case.

Blue Line Station’s live conversation has been a great forum for opinions and comments during the games and it is active now.  Feel free to join in as we root the Rangers to knot this series and gain home ice advantage.