The Rangers begin their first road trip of the season with a few games in Pittsburgh, starting Friday night, before heading to Buffalo for two more.
“Obviously, if there’s a crowd in the building, it’s changing the whole dynamic of the game, I think it’s going to make a small difference,” head coach David Quinn said on Wednesday. ‘But hopefully we were a pretty good road team in the second half of the year. If we can continue the trend we started similarly last year. ”
Before the coronavirus pandemic suspended the regular season 2019-20 in March, the Rangers set a 10-1-1 record in their last 12 away games. In the shortened 56-game schedule this season, the Rangers will play 28 times on the road.
While the NHL has rearranged the divisions to reduce travel, many protocols have been put in place to limit the players’ interaction with not only the public but also with each other. The capitals were fined $ 100,000 on Wednesday after a group of players gathered in a hotel room without covering their faces.
Shortly afterwards, Alex Ovechkin, Evgeny Kuznetsov, Dmitry Orlov and Ilya Samsonov were placed on the league list of players who, according to their coronavirus guidelines, were not available to play or practice. Everyone will miss at least the next four games of Washington.
Quinn said the Rangers’ coaching staff has addressed the fine of the Capitals and reiterated the importance of following the protocols on the road this season.
‘Of course we paid attention to what happened to Washington, and we talked about it as a team. [Thursday], “he said.” When we get to Pittsburgh, we’ll definitely remind them of the details and go through all the protocol if we get to Pittsburgh, too. “
Artemi Panarin took to Instagram on Thursday to show his support for Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny ahead of the planned protests in his home country over the weekend.
The star wing posts a photo of Navalny, his wife and their two children, with a caption translated to: ‘Freedom for Navalny’.
Navalny, a well-known critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin, was poisoned by a nerve agent in August and spent his recovery in a hospital in Germany. When Navalny returned to Russia on Sunday, he was immediately arrested and sent to a Moscow detention facility, where he is expected to await breach of the terms of his probationary period due to a 2014 embezzlement case.
Blackhawks defender and fellow Russian Nikita Zadorov posted Panarin’s pro-Navalny message on Thursday.
Igor Shesterkin will start in the Net for the Rangers against the Penguins on Friday.
Brendan Lemieux, Brett Howden and Julien Gauthier took some representatives on Thursday as a fourth rule. But Kevin Rooney later replaced Gauthier and centered Lemieux and Howden, with Colin Blackwell turning.
“It’s a decision we’ve not made yet,” Quinn said of the fourth line. ‘Julien obviously shows a lot of good qualities, he’s big, he’s strong, he can skate. I just think he’s still learning the NHL game, systematically, understanding certain situations, and he’s putting a lot of time and effort into it. ”
The Rangers assigned Morgan Barron and Matthew Robertson of the taxi team to the team’s AHL subsidiary in Hartford. The Wolf Pack’s training camp is already underway.