Girardi out tonight with injury, Clendening paired with Staal
The Rangers will be without defenseman Dan Girardi for tonight’s game at the Garden against the visiting Nashville Predators. It appears that Girardi suffered an injury blocking a shot in Tuesday night’s game against the Ducks.
AV says Girardi will miss tonight's game after blocking a shot Tuesday. Holden will move up with McDonagh. Clendening back in w/ Staal. #NYR
— New York Rangers (@NYRangers) February 9, 2017
The veteran defenseman has missed more than two games in a season just once in his career. Prior to this season Girardi had missed just two regular season games in the last five years. His surname has become synonymous with durability.
Girardi played had 23:09 TOI (second among Rangers’ defensemen) against the Ducks. So it’s intriguing to see him out of the lineup tonight. Maybe this is Alain Vigneault going back to being more careful with the 32-year-old defensemen.
This will be Adam Clendening’s first game back in the lineup for the Rangers since the return of Marc Staal. He last played on January 25th against the Flyers. Clendening has three assists in 10 games at Madison Square Garden this year.
The Rangers and Predators play at 7:00PM.