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NY Post
New York Post
7 Nov 2023


NextImg:What changes are in store after the Rangers’ run of injury good luck ran out with Adam Fox

Read the expert take on the Blueshirts

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Do you know how long it’s been since the Rangers incurred an injury as impactful as the one sustained by Adam Fox last Thursday against the Hurricanes, which landed the club’s best player on long-term injured reserve and will sideline him for at least 24 days?

Cue the elderly Rose:

“It’s been 84 years…”

An exaggeration, perhaps, but in hockey life, not an egregious one. Because the fact is it has been at least four years since the Blueshirts lost an essential core piece for this amount of prescribed time.

That’s kind of unheard of.

The Blueshirts have not been hit this hard since Mika Zibanejad sustained a neck injury on a reverse hit delivered by Patrice Bergeron at the Garden on Oct. 27, 2019, sidelining the first-line center for 13 games and just under a month.

This is a reminder of just how fortunate the Blueshirts have been over the last quadrennial.

Ryan Lindgren did miss 17 of 18 games during a stretch late last season because of a shoulder injury that was adjudged “day-to-day.” The defenseman never went on LTIR.

The neck issue Mika Zibanejad suffered in 2019 was the most recent injury comparable to Adam Fox’s for the Rangers.
Icon Sportswire via Getty Images

Igor Shesterkin has dealt with several lower-body matters over the past four years, but was never down for an extended period.

Fox, Jacob Trouba and K’Andre Miller combined to play 484 of 492 possible games over the past two seasons.

Last year, seven Rangers played all 82 with another three missing just one match.

Fox, who sustained the injury on Sebastian Aho’s borderline dirty, albeit unpenalized, leg-on-leg hit, is expected to be down for perhaps a month. There is no indication this represents a season-ending issue.

If there is a silver lining to this dark cloud that has suddenly appeared, it is that Fox — who has seemed to wear down a bit in the playoffs the past couple of years — should be fresher down the stretch and into the tournament.

Want to catch a game? The Rangers schedule with links to buy tickets can be found here.

As there is a fixed minimum to Fox’s absence — a player must be sidelined for 10 games and 24 days to qualify for LTIR — uncertainty also will be kept to a minimum.

This is not a day-to-day scenario. Head coach Peter Laviolette and his staff have the chance to plot a course for the intermediate future.

Forgive Laviolette, though, if he is not dancing a jig because of this newly granted opportunity.

Peter Laviolette will have a lot of lineup shuffling to do over the next month without Adam Fox.
Charles Wenzelberg/New York Post

“I don’t think there’s any comfort in losing Adam Fox,” the head coach said.

Saturday, the Miller-Trouba pair remained intact while Erik Gustafsson moved from the left on the third tandem to the right on the second unit with Lindgren.

Zac Jones was drawn in as Braden Schneider’s third-pair partner after having played just one of the first 10 matches and being designated as a healthy scratch the prior eight contests.

Gustafsson has been on the ice for 10 of the Rangers’ 17 goals at five-on-five, the most on the club while also on for just five of the 16 the club has surrendered. It makes sense Laviolette would want to add responsibility to Gustafsson — who, you may have heard, played for the coach in Washington last season — with Fox being down. (Fox somehow had been on for just three Rangers goals at five-on-five.)

But the Jones-Schneider pairing, used both in Columbus when Lindgren was out of the lineup and then again Saturday in the 5-4 shootout loss in Minnesota, has been crushed. Neither defenseman seems to be able to calm his partner or slow down the game. Indeed, the young’uns seem to bring out the worst in each other.

In 25:06 of ice time, the Jones-Schneider combination has been on for three goals against and none for with a 42.86 percent attempts share and an expected goals percentage of 40.82. In 12:58 of ice time on Saturday, the pair was on for 13 Wild scoring chances, per Natural Stat Trick.

Laviolette said following Monday’s practice that he has no issue with playing young defensemen together. He talked about a group failing on Saturday.

Erik Gustafsson has received additional responsibilities in the early days of Adam Fox’s absence.
NHLI via Getty Images

“It wasn’t just one young defenseman or two young defensemen,” the coach said. “We need to be better as a group.”

Still, it would be no surprise if Connor Mackey, the 27-year-old free-agent signee with 39 games of prior NHL experience who was recalled on Sunday from the AHL Wolf Pack, supplants Jones in the lineup and on the third pair for Tuesday’s match at the Garden against Detroit.

When Zibanejad went down nine games into the 2019-20 season, he was skating between Chris Kreider and Pavel Buchnevich. The Rangers recalled Filip Chytil, who’d been sent down to the Wolf Pack following a very disappointing training camp, to fill No. 93’s spot.

Chytil did his best between the two upper-echelon wingers, and he has been here to stay. By the way, the Rangers’ second center was Ryan Strome. The third was, yes, Brett Howden, and the fourth was, yes indeed, Lias Andersson, at least for a time wearing No. 28 if anyone can recall him in that sweater.

Then came Greg McKegg and a dollop of Boo Nieves before Zibanejad returned and Howden became the steady (you choose the definition) fourth-liner.

Andersson had been sent to the AHL by the time No. 93 returned and indeed already had played his final game in the Blueshirt.

Speaking of Chytil, the team’s second-line center suffered a suspected concussion Thursday, perhaps in a first-period collision with former teammate Jesper Fast, though it originally appeared as if there had been no damage.

The Rangers likely will be very careful in clearing Filip Chytil to play again after he suffered what may be the third concussion of his career last week against the Hurricanes.
Getty Images

While missing time is an anomaly for Fox, this has become a way of life for Chytil. This marks the 10th separate time that No. 72 has been sidelined since 2018-19 and the sixth time with an “upper body” issue.

Chytil has missed one game once; two games, three times; three games, twice; five games once; six games once; and 14 games with a believed broken wrist in 2020-21. He was sidelined for two weeks during training camp with an unrelated upper-body matter.

If indeed concussed now, it is believed to be the third such recorded injury of the 24-year-old’s career. That is a concern.