Bantering Points: 4/14/17
News and notes for Friday, April 14th, 2017
After sitting on the sidelines and watching the action last night, the Rangers and Canadiens will square off again in Game 2 tonight. With no teams having made any lineup changes in practice yesterday, it will be interesting to see how Montreal adjusts to Henrik Lundqvist returning to his vintage form, and if there is anything they can do to solve The King. Here are today's news and links:
Rangers News:
- Brett Cyrgalis hears that Alain Vigneault had some fun with the French media during his availability session (NY Post)
- Larry Brooks notes that Jeff Gorton is only focused on his team's current playoff run, and hopes his players are as well (NY Post)
- Steve Zipay relays word from Jimmy Vesey that the Harvard-educated rookie will never forget his first playoff game (Newsday)
- Justin Tasch points out how New York is expecting a different Montreal team to come out for Game 2 (NY Daily News)
- Game Preview: Look for Montreal to use their big-bodied players like Dwight King to crowd Henrik Lundqvist to try and generate chances (CBS)
- Justin Rutherford offers his thoughts before the puck drops for Game 2 later tonight (Blue Seat Blogs)
- Shayna Goldman argues that the Rangers can ill-afford to get sucked into Montreal's heavy playing style if they want to win the series (FanRag)
- Tyler Kluepfel believes that Alain Vigneault must find the right forward combinations if the Rangers want to make a deep run into the spring (Blue Line Station)
- Alexandra Russo writes Tanner Glass should remain in the lineup until his puck luck runs out (Blue Line Station)
- Post Practice Interviews: Alain Vigneault,(5:47) Brendan Smith,(3:45) Henrik Lundqvist,(4:00) Jimmy Vesey,(1:59) Tanner Glass,(1:38) and Rick Nash (2:05) (Official Team Site)/
Around the NHL:
- Sean Leahy saw that a luck Edmonton Oilers fan won $336,000 during the team's 50/50 raffle at Game 1. To put it in simpler terms, that's enough money for 4,200 concourse passes to an Oilers playoff game (Puck Daddy)
- Jared Clinton breaks down why the Vegas Golden Knights decision to hire Gerard Gallant as their first head coach is a smart one (The Hockey News)
- Detroit Red Wings' players Dylan Larkin, Danny DeKeyser, and Jimmy Howard were three of the twelve NHL players named to the United States roster for the 2017 IIHF World Championships (Sportsnet)
- Garret Hohl dives into scientific progress and diminishing returns in the field of hockey statistics (Hockey Graphs)/