Preview: Rangers Open Road Trip Against Predators

RANGERS at PREDATORS, 8 p.m.MSG2, 1050 AM
There are no breaks until the Break now for the Rangers, 12 games in 22 days remaining until their bye week around the All-Star Game in late January. "We know we have a tough schedule coming up," Mika Zibanejad said.
They will close out the 2018 portion of that schedule with a pair of road tests in Western Conference rinks, beginning a stretch of seven of the next nine games away from home. It begins on Saturday night at Bridgestone Arena with Henrik Lundqvist in the nets against a Nashville team that began the season with a win at Madison Square Garden and led the NHL out of the gates, but right now is just out to steady itself.
The Rangers, having earned points in 14 of their last 15 home games, are looking for some traction off Broadway after winning just once in their last seven road games. The Predators, meanwhile, carry their longest losing streak in three years into the matchup, a five-game skid (0-4-1) with the last four losses coming in regulation, during which the Predators have scored only four goals.

Both teams will be happy to have some reinforcements from the injured list: for the Rangers, Jesper Fast (upper body) and Cody McLeod (fractured hand) are due to make their returns up front, while Kevin Shattenkirk is right behind those two - Shattenkirk may not crack the lineup on Saturday, but the blueliner traveled with the team to Tennessee and David Quinn said "on this trip I'll be shocked if he doesn't play."
To make room on the 23-man roster, the Rangers on Friday sent Lias Andersson to Hartford. The 20-year-old rookie has played in 21 games for the Rangers since his Nov. 5 call-up; he has 12 points (4-8-12) in 14 games for the Wolf Pack this season.
"He's made some great progress, he's done some good things, we just need more consistency out of him. I know it's difficult for him playing seven or eight minutes, but that's just the situation we're in," David Quinn said after Andersson practiced with the Rangers on Friday in Westchester. "It didn't make sense for him to stay here especially with the limited practice time we're going to have over the next three weeks. He needs to go play.
"He's done the things we've asked him to do. As I've touched on before, it's not out of the ordinary for a 20-year-old to continue to learn how to consistently play at this level. He's going to be a really good player, he's made good strides. He's going to get to where we need him to be sooner than later. But we think this is the best spot for him."
McLeod, meanwhile, has missed 14 with a fractured hand suffered on Nov. 21 when he reluctantly dropped the gloves with Ross Johnston of the Islanders in a game the Rangers were leading 3-0 at the time. Fast has sat out five games, while Shattenkirk made an early exit from the Rangers' Dec. 10 game in Tampa with his shoulder injury (six games).
"Anytime you get NHL players back it really helps your depth and it can give your team more confidence," Quinn said. "Guys look around the room and see these guys - Quickie and Cody and Shatty coming back, it just gives your whole team a better feel and can give you a whole new level of confidence."
Shattenkirk had been skating on his own for about a week, but joined his teammates on Friday for the second straight day with no restrictions and said afterward that it "felt really good. It was the first time I was able to bump some guys around, and get bumped around a little bit too. … So I felt like I kind of checked off some boxes and felt good working through it. I really feel like it's coming and we're close."
Shattenkirk added that as a team, "we can't get too down on ourselves," and as frustrating as Thursday night's shootout loss to Columbus was for the Rangers - for the fifth time in six home games they brought it to overtime, but have lost all five of those games - they were clear-eyed on Friday about what they have been doing well enough and what they need to shore up as they hit the road.
Quinn was determined to clean up a late-game zone exit that on Thursday culminated in a Ranger icing and the defensive-zone draw off which Zach Werenski scored the game-tying goal. "There were five things we could have done that would have prevented us from having to ice the puck," the coach said Friday. "We've just got to continue to work on it and get better."
Marc Staal said he can see the Rangers' confidence in late-game situations wavering back toward where it was prior to the team's November surge, but he knows there's no mystery the team has to crack. "It's not like we haven't done it - we went 9-1-1 and we were closing out games, and knowing how to win in the third period," said Staal, who led all Rangers on Thursday with 23:14 on ice. "We're just a little shaky in that area right now, we're not overly confident in playing in those situations. We're just finding ways to lose, and you can't do that. Confidence comes with winning."
Saturday's matchup at Bridgestone Arena will close out the home-and-home season series with Nashville that began on Opening Night, Oct. 4 at the Garden, and the Rangers are well aware that Nashville's success begins from the goal crease out: Pekka Rinne leads the NHL in goals-against average at 2.15, and as a team, the Predators are the stingiest in the league, allowing 2.53 goals per game. And the Predators have one of the league's deeper defense corps that likes to join the attack, led by captain Roman Josi and bolstered by the return of P.K. Subban on Thursday after six weeks on injured reserve.
Viktor Arvidsson also returned to Nashville's lineup for Thursday's game, which became the Predators' fifth consecutive loss, this one by 2-0 to the Stars in which Dallas goalie Anton Khudobin made a career-high 49 saves. Filip Forsberg (upper body) remains on injured reserve for Nashville, and he also remains the team's leading goal-scorer with 14, even though he has missed a month. Craig Smith is the only other Predator in double digits, with 10 goals.
"I think if we stick to our structure the way we've been playing lately, nothing has to change," said Vlad Namestnikov, who has a goal and three assists over the last four games, and had another assist taken away on an offside challenge on Thursday. "They do have high-end defensemen, and they like to jump in the rush. You have to have your guy all the time, maybe against them take an extra look and make sure he doesn't beat you to the net or anything like that."

PROJECTED LINEUP

20 Kreider - 93 Zibanejad - 17 Fast
90 Namestnikov - 13 Hayes - 36 Zuccarello
72 Chytil - 21 Howden - 89 Buchnevich
26 Vesey - 16 Strome - 8 McLeod
18 Staal - 44 Pionk
76 Skjei - 54 McQuaid
33 Claesson - 42 Smith
30 Lundqvist
40 Georgiev

NUMBERS GAME

Kevin Hayes, whose points streak stands at eight games, is the first Ranger to put up 15 points in an eight-game span since Jaromir Jagr in 2005-06. Nashville was shut out for the third time on home ice Thursday, most in the NHL. The Predators stood at 13-3-0 on Nov. 10; they are 9-11-2 since.

PLAYERS TO WATCH

Jimmy Vesey, Nashville's third-round pick (66th overall) in 2012, has eight points in 10 December games, and an even or plus rating in each of them.
Roman Josi, Nashville's captain, is among the NHL's top 10 in goals (seven) and points (28) by a defenseman.