Preview: Rangers Set For Tilt With Bruins at The Garden

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The Rangers and Bruins come together again on Wednesday night at Madison Square Garden, for the second time in six games, covering a span of 19 days and bridging the All-Star break - a little vacation that was made so much more enjoyable for the Rangers by what sent them into it, a grind-it-out 3-2 victory in Beantown.
In the four intervening games, the Rangers have put together a stirring come-from-behind win in Newark, which fell in the midst of three home games that have added up to three one-goal losses. They have gone 0-2-1 in those games but do not feel it's a stretch to think they could have been 3-0.
"A loss is a loss, but you can look at the film and be happy with the structure we played," Kevin Hayes said following a practice session in Westchester on Tuesday in preparation for the middle game of a season-long five-game homestand. "You just can't be happy with the result."

Hayes, who has three points (1-2-3) in the last three games, was watching from the rafters during the Rangers' visit to Boston on Jan. 19; it was the last of the nine games Hayes would sit out with an upper-body injury leading into the All-Star break. "The guys played great in that game," he said, "Hank played great, Mika played great. (The Bruins) are a good team, we know we've got to come ready (on Wednesday)."
They'll come with Alexandar Georgiev in goal, handing the rookie netminder his second start in five games out of the All-Star break, and his 15th this season. "Hank's played a lot of hockey, and Georgie played well in his last game" - in which he was the hard-luck loser in a 1-0 defeat to Philly last Tuesday - "and we want to get him back in there," David Quinn said on Tuesday.
Like Hayes, Neal Pionk also sat out the Jan. 19 game in Boston, still nursing a lower-body ailment, and as Pionk continues to work his way back, David Quinn and Co. see it in the 23-year-old defenseman's best interests to take a breather from the lineup when the Bruins visit the Garden on Wednesday.
"Listen, we've asked him to do an awful lot, he's played against everybody's top players, done a really good job. The injury kind of slowed him down a little bit, I think he's lost a little bit of his confidence," said Quinn, after a practice in which Pionk skated on a pair with injured defenseman Freddy Claesson. "Might be good to give him a night off, get back to feeling good about himself, kind of work on some things that we've got to address to get him back to playing the way he was."
Pionk got into 41 of the Rangers' first 43 games this season, and has played in 46 of the team's 52 overall. Prior to his first pro season last year, when he played 76 games between the Rangers and the Wolf Pack, his longest schedule in junior or college was a 61-game slate, including playoffs, in the USHL. This season, he leads the Blueshirts in ice time, averaging 22:14 per game, and leads all Ranger defensemen in goals (five) and points (15).
With the Rangers starting February with 12 games in 23 days, Quinn believes it is time to ease his workload, if only for a night.
"This is a guy that's stepped in this year and has played 23 minutes a night, against everybody's top pairings and lines, he's killing penalties, he's playing power play - we've asked him to do an awful lot. He's responded very well to it," Quinn said of Pionk, who has played against every NHL team except the Rangers and Bruins. "Again, we've touched on this with these young players: There's going to be peaks and valleys, they're going to have some down times. He's going through a little bit of one right now.
"With our situation we couldn't pace (his minutes). He was playing so well he was clearly one of our top defensemen, and he earned the opportunity to play against everybody's top players and power play, penalty kill. We ran him as far as we could, and then he ran into the injury situation which I think slowed him down a little bit. … I thought during that stretch where he was sucking it up and playing through a tough injury - give him a lot of credit, that's how tough he is - I thought he lost a little bit of his confidence and swagger through that process, and we've got to help him get it back."
That last part doesn't seem to be an issue with Mika Zibanejad, as he and his linemates continued their roll on Monday night against the Kings. The Rangers' top center has 17 points (9-8-17) over his last nine games; two of those nine goals came in Boston on Jan. 19, including the third-period game-winner. As a line, Zibanejad, Mats Zuccarello and Chris Kreider have combined on 33 points (14-19-33) over the last six games with all three in action.
Filip Chytil scored the other Ranger goal in that Jan. 19 game, and in doing so was knocked from behind into Bruins goaltender Tuukka Rask, who suffered a concussion in the crash. Rask sat out the next game but has returned to start the last three games for the Bruins, including Tuesday's home win over the Islanders - so coach Bruce Cassidy has signaled his plans to start Jaroslav Halak on Wednesday at the Garden. Halak came on in relief on Jan. 19 and was tagged with the loss after Zibanejad beat him twice.
David Pastrnak had a pair of assists in Tuesday's win - the second when he passed up an empty-netter to let Patrice Bergeron have it in his 1,000th game - to raise his team-leading total to 64 points (30-34-64) and crack the top 10 in NHL scoring.
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Jesper Fast took a maintenance day on Tuesday, the third straight practice he has skipped, though he has played in all the games and Quinn expressed no concerns.
"He's just got a situation where we think it's probably just best to hold him out on days leading into games, the coach said. "He's a guy that gives his all - I'm not worried about his conditioning, his sharpness.
"This is a guy that gives his all, shift in and shift out. Nobody comes to the bench more exhausted than Quickie after every shift, because he's given his all. So his conditioning certainly is not going to suffer from not practicing."
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Cody McLeod will rejoin the lineup, playing on a line with Boo Nieves and Jimmy Vesey. Nieves got off to a fast start in Monday's game against the Kings, and had a pair of scoring chances before the game was five minutes old - he nearly set up Vesey for a tap-in goal (Derek Forbort reached in and broke it up) less than two minutes in, then, forcing a turnover with Zuccarello while killing a penalty, he raced in on a shorthanded but was stopped by Jonathan Quick.
"Zucc made a really good play," Nieves said on Tuesday, though he seemed to regret his own choice on the breakaway.
"I skate with Quickie over the summer," he said, referring to Quick, not Fast. "I tried to beat him five-hole. But that's one of his strengths, and obviously it showed again last night."
On Tuesday, Quinn said of Nieves: "When he's just thinking about keeping it simple and using his speed and being in the right position structurally, he's going to get chances, and I thought that's what he did last night."
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Claesson (shoulder) skated in a red no-contact sweater for the second straight day, after taking part in Monday morning's pregame skate.

PROJECTED LINEUP

20 Kreider - 93 Zibanejad - 36 Zuccarello
89 Buchnevich - 13 Hayes - 17 Fast
72 Chytil - 16 Strome - 90 Namestnikov
8 McLeod - 24 Nieves - 26 Vesey
18 Staal - 77 DeAngelo
76 Skjei - 54 McQuaid
42 Smith - 22 Shattenkirk
40 Georgiev
30 Lundqvist

NUMBERS GAME

The Rangers are 8-1 in their last nine games against the Bruins, and have allowed no more than two goals in each of those eight wins. The Blueshirts' penalty kill is 26-for-27 (96.3%) in those nine games.
Alexandar Georgiev has held opponents to one goal in two of his last three starts (.955 save percentage vs. Islanders and Flyers).
Boston's power play, 0-for-3 on Tuesday night, is tied for third in the league at 26.8 percent. The Bruins have scored multiple power-play goals in 13 games this season, tied with Tampa Bay for most in the NHL. They have also allowed 10 shorthanded goals, second-most in the league.
The Bruins are 7-1-1 in the second game of a back-to-back this season.

PLAYERS TO WATCH

Kevin Shattenkirk, who set up Mika Zibanejad's game-winner in these teams' first meeting on Jan. 19, has a four-game point streak against the Bruins.
Patrice Bergeron scored twice against the Islanders on Tuesday night in his 1,000th NHL game, all with the Bruins. He has four goals in his last four games overall, and 780 points (307-473-780) in 1,000 games.