Rangers at Sharks preview

RANGERS (15-12-3) at SHARKS (15-16-2)
10:30 p.m. ET; NBCSCA, MSG, NHL.TV

Boughner, who had been an assistant with the Sharks, was promoted after coach Peter DeBoer was fired on Wednesday.
San Jose, trying to end a five-game winless streak (0-4-1), has been outscored 22-7 during the skid.
Joe Thornton will become the 12th in NHL history to play in 1,600 regular-season games; The 40-year-old center will join forward Patrick Marleau (1,686 games played) as the first teammates in League history to appear in the same game with each having reached the 1,600-game plateau.
The Rangers seek their seventh victory in 11 games; they're 6-3-1 in their past 10 after going 2-3-1 in their previous six.
Goalie Alexandar Georgiev will start; he's 4-1-0 with a 1.81 goals-against average and .954 save percentage in his past five starts.

Players to watch

Rangers forward Artemi Panarin has four points (three goals, one assist) in his past four games.
Sharks defenseman Erik Karlsson has six assists in his past seven games.

They said it

"You just never know with a coaching change how quickly people make changes that are going to be that impactful. But at the end of the day, we expect a hard game, regardless of who's coaching the San Jose Sharks." -- Rangers coach David Quinn
"I'm still a long ways away from [Patrick Marleau], but it's something special. And I would just like a win for my 1,600th game." -- Sharks center Joe Thornton

Rangers projected lineup

Artemi Panarin -- Ryan Strome -- Kaapo Kakko
Chris Kreider -- Mika Zibanejad -- Pavel Buchnevich
Greg McKegg -- Filip Chytil -- Jesper Fast
Brendan Smith -- Brett Howden -- Micheal Haley
Brady Skjei -- Jacob Trouba
Marc Staal -- Tony DeAngelo
Ryan Lindgren -- Adam Fox
Alexandar Georgiev
Henrik Lundqvist
Scratched: None
Injured: Libor Hajek (knee), Brendan Lemieux (undisclosed)

Sharks projected lineup

Evander Kane -- Logan Couture - Timo Meier
Tomas Hertl -- Joe Thornton -- Kevin Labanc
Patrick Marleau -- Barclay Goodrow --
Joachim Blichfeld
Marcus Sorensen -- Dylan Gambrell -- Melker Karlsson
Marc-Edouard Vlasic -- Erik Karlsson
Brenden Dillon -- Brent Burns
Mario Ferraro - Tim Heed
Martin Jones
Aaron Dell
Scratched: Lukas Radil, Noah Gregor
Injured: Dalton Prout (upper body), Antti Suomela (upper body), Radim Simek (knee)

Status report

Lemieux will be a game-time decision. … Suomela and Simek each participated in the morning skate wearing a non-contact jersey.

Stat pack

Trouba has seven points (two goals, five assists) in his past seven games. … Burns has no points in his past nine games. … Thornton has not scored a goal since March 18 of last season - a span of 41 consecutive regular-season games.