The Rangers kick off the pre-season Monday against the Devils. Tomorrow will be the first of six pre-season games played by the Blueshirts as they prepare for their season-opener October 4 against Nashville. Home-and-home matchups versus New Jersey, the Islanders and Philadelphia comprise the six games that will be played over a course of 10 days. I would presume that New York will have their first round of cuts next Sunday prior to the final three pre-season contests.
Here is tomorrow's lineup. I used Carp's rather than Rangers' tweet since he added the uniform numbers. Marek Mazanec and Alexandar Georgiev are first up in the battle to backup Henrik Lundqvist, with each likely playing 30 minutes. Look for Dustin Tokarski to probably play Wednesday. On the blue line, Frederik Claesson, Ryan O'Gara, Neal Pionk and Tony DeAneglo all get the initial opportunity to show they should break camp with the parent club. Up front, Boo Nieves tries to prove he should be the fourth line center, while Lias Andersson is in the lineup and Filip Chytil goes Wednesday or Saturday, the same with Brett Howden. We get our first looks in NHL game action at Michael Lindqvist and Ville Meskanen, both of whom played well in Traverse City, as well as Tim Gettinger, who should open the year in Hartford.
Monday's projected lineup, could change. #NYR at NJ:
— Rick Carpiniello (@RickCarpiniello) September 16, 2018
32-Mazanec
40-Georgiev
8-McLeod
13-Hayes
17-Fast
18-Staal
20-Kreider
24-Nieves
29-Schneider
33-Claesson
34-Lindqvist
38-Fogarty
44-Pionk
46-O’Gara
50-Andersson
55-Lindgren
77-DeAngelo
81-Meskanen
89-Buchnevich
97-Gettinger
David Quinn spoke about the importance of winning 1-on-1 battles. Evidence of that is in the below video, with a forward and d-man going 1-on-1 in camp, where the offense man tried to protect the puck while the other does whatever he can, legally, to try and create a turnover. Unfortunately, one casualty of this drill was Mike Zibanejad, who took what appeared to be an inadvertent shoulder to the head from Joey Keane and left the ice immediately to go to the trainer’s room.
David Quinn spoke yesterday about emphasizing one-on-one battles I camp. So here's a little bit of what they're doing today. pic.twitter.com/tL3xBJSzMD
— Colin Stephenson (@ColinASteph) September 16, 2018
Given's Zib's concussion history - nine games missed last November-December with a concussion and and four or five in his career - Rangers' twitter was not surprisingly in a bit of a panic. Fortunately, as seen below in the tweet from Brett Cyrgalis, coach Quinn said that Zib just had the wind knocked out of him. Based on the way the hit was described and that it occurred to the head, forgive me if I am not ready to rule Zib out of the woods just yet. As we have seen in the past, a delayed reaction to a prior hit could occur, and knowing Zib's history, I am hoping nothing untoward does occur. In addition, New York is making the wise move sitting him tomorrow, and honestly, I would sit him for the week to be on the safe side. In addition, when an incident like this occurs, Kevin Hayes' value spikes more than a little bit.
Zibanejad took a hit in the head in practice today, but Quinn said “he’s fine.… Just had the wind knocked out of him. He could play tomorrow night in Newark. #NYR
— Brett Cyrgalis (@BrettCyrgalis) September 16, 2018