The New York Rangers are set to play the third game of their 2025-26 NHL season tonight in Pittsburgh, and they have just been handed one of their first major challenges of the season to date. The team was forced to play shorthanded during their most recent loss against the Buffalo Sabres, and it was just announced that they will be without a key top six forward on a week-to-week basis.
Vincent Trocheck (upper body) will not play tonight and is considered week-to-week, per #NYR
— Vince Z. Mercogliano (@vzmercogliano) October 11, 2025
Trocheck's absence will be felt
Trocheck wasn't involved in a big hit of note during Thursday's game vs. the Buffalo Sabres, and no one in the building noticed anything wrong at first. It was noted by the media in attendance that Trocheck left the bench, but as to why that was the case was not known. Since joining the Rangers Trocheck had appeared in every regular season and playoff game with the club, so this latest news is bad news.
Rangers will now have to adjust from their new strategy introduced to start season
Once Trocheck left the game against the Buffalo Sabres, Mike Sullivan shifted Mika Zibanejad back to center, something they were looking to avoid this early into the season. This is the first year that Zibanejad is starting the season as a winger, the entirety of his career prior had him as a center. With Trocheck out on a week-to-week basis, it is likely Zibanejad will play in the middle, and Jonny Brodzinski or Juuso Parssinen can enter the lineup as a winger.
Rangers will get early chance to try things out
The Rangers are in Pittsburgh on Saturday to take on the Penguins, and they then return to New York on Sunday for a game vs. the Washington Capitals. The back-to-back games present an opportunity for Sullivan to try some different combinations out, and for now he will need to work with the players on the roster. The team doesn't have cap space to callup a winger like Gabe Perreault, so the team will need to try and make due with what they've got in the interim.