The Rangers close their pre-All-Star Game section of the schedule with a home contest Wednesday against the Flyers. New York enters the game having won three in a row, bolstered by a suddenly red-hot Henrik Lundqvist. Philly is 3-5-2 in their last 10, but won their previous contest and are in a battle for the eighth playoff spot in the conference.
The lines Wednesday are expected to be the same as they were to start Sunday's and Monday's game:
Kreider-Stepan-Zucc Nash-Zib-Buch Grabner-Miller-Vesey Puempel-Lindberg-Pirri
McDonagh-Girardi Holden-Klein Skjei-Clendening
Lundqvist
As we all know, the lines that ended Monday's contest were slightly different than what began the game. Kreider and Buch were moved down while Puempel and Pirri were moved up. Who wasn't moved up, bypassed for a top-six role, was Jimmy Vesey.
(Update from morning skate: Puempel and Vesey swap spots. Also, Pirri off the first power-play unit, swaped with Vesey. 27, 36, 26, 20, 21. Then: 4, 73, 89, 61, 93. Interestingly, still no Miller on either unit because first and second regular lines remain intact on the PP)
Larry Brooks had two interesting hypothesis on Vesey in Wednesday's NY Post:
First. he praised the Rangers for their recent willingness to drop the gloves to defend their teammates, showing a physical edge that had been lacking. One instance where no response transpired occurred when Buffalo’s Derek Grant (since waived to Nashville) caught Vesey with his head down fishing for the puck after making a move across the line and sent the rookie flying with a legal blow in the third period of a Jan. 3 match at the Garden.
Brooks hypothesizes that this incident has resulted in Vesey being afraid - my words, not his, but implicit in what he wrote, to go to the dirty areas leading to his recent slump. Here is precisely what Brooks wrote: "Cause and effect, maybe or maybe not at all, but Vesey has all but disappeared since that incident. Harvard has not only failed to pick up a point in the eight games that have followed but he also has been a non-factor on the forecheck and in the dirty areas in which he had made a considerable impact through the first three months."
First, kind of a low blow calling him Harvard, using it as a derisive term. Second, you also have just called him soft by implying he is no longer willing to pay the price in front. Third, Brooks attempts to give himself a way out, say cause and effect, maybe or maybe not, allowing you to make that call but he sure has planted the seed that Vesey has become soft.
His second hypothesis is that Vesey and not Pirri or Puempel will sit when Jesper Fast returns from his injury after the all-Star break. In addition, one more will need to sit when Kevin Hayes comes back from his left leg/knee injury around the second week of February. Pirri has become a stalwart on one of the power play units, possibly keeping him in the lineup. While Puempel, who has six goals in the 14 games he played since New York claimed him on waivers in late-November, has shown the scorers' touch that made him the 24th overall pick in the 2011 draft. AV will play who he feels is the right two of the four to go and it may end up a rotation. Pirri or Puempel could play on the third line with J.T. Miller or Hayes, moving Grabner to the fourth line. It's also possible Grabner sticks on that trio, leaving Fast as one-third of the line with two of Oscar Lindberg/Pirri/Puempel/Hayes making up the rest of the trio. But it's also possible one - likely Lindberg is dealt - to bring in a blueliner, since it's somewhat remote that New York carries two extra forwards due to the cap hit.