New York Rangers Spotlight: Henrik Lundqvist
At season's end, Rob did an analysis of each player on the roster, and gave some thoughts on what lies ahead for each one. Since so many of you are new to Blueshirt Banter, we thought we would bring some of those profiles to you again. Today we have Rob's look at Henrik Lundqvist:
#30 - Henrik Lundqvist (Age: 27) - Grade: A
Henrik Lundqvist performed the best of all Rangers during the 2008-2009 season. Career high in Wins: check. Typical GAA less than 2.50: check. Save Percentage over .915: check. You get the idea, King Henrik's rule did not lessen in '08-'09. Along with this, everyone knows Henrik basically won us the three playoff games against the Capitals, and he kept us in Game 7 for 55 minutes. And as I've said before, the Rangers have an elite NHL goaltender who could really dominate with some scoring support. It's all on you, Glen Sather.
Final thought from Jim: What else can be said about the man who almost single-handedly took the Rangers into the 2nd round of the playoffs? Someday, the "Richter vs. Lundqvist" debate will be a good one, but not yet.
One thing I think the Rangers are going to have to be careful of with Henrik is keeping him fresh. Henrik will undoubtedly be returning to the Olympics for Sweden, after leading them to the gold in 2006, and combine that with the compressed schedule due to the 2 week layoff, and I'd expect Valley to see more playing time this season than usual.
Contract Information:
Lundqvist is signed through the end of the 2013 season at $6.875M per year