Regarding the Rangers, going for the sweep of their four-game road trip, which concludes Saturday afternoon at Ottawa:
1. So maybe it’s the NHL team that should be called the Wolf Pack, because when one Ranger is challenged on the ice, his four teammates immediately descend to lend support and protection.
This pack mentality was on display throughout the 3-1 victory at Nashville on Thursday. Kevin Rooney was shoved in front after setting a screen, and his teammates were there. Patrik Nemeth was pushed back into goaltender Igor Shesterkin during a scramble and lo and behold, there was a five-on-five scrum.
The same happened when Ryan Reaves was involved at the side boards. And of course, when Sammy Blais was elbowed in the face by Matt Benning, Dryden Hunt was there for the cause.
A metamorphosis is taking place. The Rangers are no longer homogenous. They are no longer polite. It is no longer a walk in the park to play against them. If you don’t think that the complexion changed in the wake of the Tom Wilson Affair, you have not been paying attention.
It is a long season. The Rangers are going to need to sprinkle in a few more goals along the way. They may need to find someone who can do that for them. The marathon has a way of exposing the truth about a team. There are miles and miles to go.
But this certainly seems to be a team of fiber. A team in the truest sense. One of the aforementioned scrums featured Alexis Lafreniere and Adam Fox, a pair who swapped their white gloves for blue collars; another involved the fourth-liners. All for one.
A pack. A hungry pack.
2. Nils Lundkvist is smart, slick and skilled. All as advertised. He has played with poise in his first four NHL games after being a healthy scratch for the opener at Washington. But he is also struggling. The play is coming at him fast and hard. The Rangers are trapped in their own end as often as not when the 21-year-old Swede is on the ice. He has not yet been dynamic with the puck at either end.
Indeed, according to Natural Stat Trick, Lundkvist has the third poorest xGF rate in the league at 30.94, ahead of only Anaheim’s Kevin Shattenkirk (24.94) and Winnipeg’s Brendan Dillon (30.47). The Lundkvist-Nemeth pair has the seventh-poorest xGF rating of tandems at 32.39.
Clearly, there is a learning curve for Lundkvist. He has acknowledged that. The question is whether he and the team — and perhaps I have reversed the order — would benefit more if Lundkvist learns how to adapt to the North American game in Hartford rather than in the NHL. Remember this: Ryan McDonagh played the first half of his first pro season in the AHL.
Whatever the decision, it is imperative that it not be guided by organizational ego. Lundkvist has been hyped for years. He was projected to make the roster and be in the top six from the moment he signed in June. None of that can factor into the analysis.
If the hierarchy believes that Lundkvist belongs in Hartford for a spell, if it is determined that Zac Jones would provide more at the moment for the Rangers, then that is the way general manager Chris Drury must go.
Oh, and please, can we all please stop with the comparisons to Fox. Yes, both Lundkvist and Fox play the right side, they both are undersized by traditional standards and they have similar styles.
But Fox — in Lundkvist’s words two days ago — “is the best defenseman in the whole world.” And Fox has been even better this year than last year. A second straight Norris Trophy is hardly out of reach.
3. I am going to go way out on a limb here to suggest that head coach Gerard Gallant probably wasn’t exactly the biggest fan of Artemi Panarin taking five even-strength shifts of more than a minute — 1:12, 1:37, 1:05, 1:41, 1:24 — against the Predators.
Panarin — whose average shift length of 0:55 ranks 11th among forwards, so obviously not out of line — seems to be forcing it more than usual, sending high-risk passes into traffic, misfiring from spots from where he’s generally money to get the puck on net. Again, the “it’s early” disclaimer applies, certainly to this player who gets the benefit of the doubt, but it is just not there yet.
Two years ago, when the power play clicked at nearly 30 percent over the final three months of the year, Panarin was almost always stationed in the left circle, from where his off-wing one timer was a lethal weapon.
But last year, Panarin and Mika Zibanejad — also setting up for an off-wing one-timer — essentially rotated at that spot. And this year, Zibanejad has been in that position with Panarin most often on the point. The power play is not 2-for-20 for that reason alone, but I do not understand why the Rangers took something that was not broken and apparently tried to fix it.