Preview: Rangers Wrap Up Road Trip at Carolina Hurricanes

RANGERS at HURRICANES, 7 p.m.MSG, 98.7 FM
RALEIGH, N.C. -- The Blueshirts embark on the final leg of their four-game road swing when they wrap up their season series with the Carolina Hurricanes on Tuesday night. One convincing win and two narrow defeats in up-for-grabs games over the first three, and the Rangers' goal is "to take one more step" - that was the mantra on Henrik Lundqvist's mind as he made his preparations on Monday.
The Rangers have outscored their opponents over the first three road games of this stretch, by a combined count of 14-12, but have gone down to a pair of one-goal defeats in games they know could have tilted either way in the third period, bracketing a thorough 6-2 win in Buffalo.
"I think we've been playing really well - the games we've won, we deserved to win," Lundqvist said on Monday of the Rangers' recent play. "We haven't had a lot of games this year when we've played bad and won. Most wins we've had, I think we earned them.
"But you start with that, and you build from that - working hard, and putting in the right attitude and mindset. You start with that and the rest will come."

Alexandar Georgiev has manned the nets in the last two games, making a combined 66 saves in Buffalo on Friday and in Pittsburgh on Sunday afternoon, and so the plan of attack for David Quinn - whose Rangers have not lost back-to-back games in regulation since Jan. 8-10 - was to turn back to Lundqvist to close out the trip against a team he has mastered in the past. In his career against the Hurricanes, Lundqvist is 29-12-1; since February of 2011, he is 20-4 with a 1.69 goals-against average and .945 save percentage.
It would be Lundqvist's third start in the last six games, a stretch that represents a lighter workload than the goaltender is generally accustomed to and one that has allowed him to focus on ironing out a few of the little things that make an enormous difference for a goaltender. Lundqvist was one of the Rangers who took the option of skating on Monday at PNC Arena, after which he said that heading into the trip finale he is "feeling pretty good."
"I think my game is close," Lundqvist said, adding: "I need to take one more step, and a lot of times that means one more save and we'll have a different outcome. I've been feeling like it's been right there for me the last few starts … so the last few days, just try to work hard, and be ready when you get to play.
"When you adjust small, small things here and there the end result will be better. I think the key for me too is not try to do too much. You want to win, I want to win, everybody wants to win, and sometimes when you have that desire, you want it so badly, you try to do a little too much instead of just let the game come to you, don't chase it."
Whether Brady Skjei gets to play against the Hurricanes after missing a game rests in the hands of trainer Jim Ramsay and the coaching staff, but in any event Skjei took a big step toward rejoining the lineup with Monday's skate. The blueliner left Friday's game with a lower-body injury after coming together with the Sabres' Jason Pominville; he did not practice on Saturday and the Rangers erred on the side of caution In holding him out of Sunday's matinee. Monday's was his first skate since.
"Good, felt really good. Nice to get back on the ice," said Skjei, who spent time working with assistant coach Greg Brown, saying he "was trying to do as much as I could out there with Brownie, and it felt good. It's a minor thing, but you never want to miss games. To get back out there and feeling healthy was good.
"We felt it was a smart decision to take a night off and let it rest another day - I was fully confident with that. … Kind of got tangled up, I didn't see (Pominville) sliding into me - got caught off-balance and tweaked something. But it's felt better every day and today on the ice it felt really good."
The Rangers, as they have most of the season, are carrying eight defensemen on their roster, bolstered by the return of Freddy Claesson on Sunday from a month on the shelf with a shoulder injury. But while Skjei took in Sunday's game from upstairs, he watched Neal Pionk take an accidental stick to the eye from Sidney Crosby, which left the Rangers a man short for the third period as Pionk was held out as a precaution, Quinn said.
Joining Skjei in making up the Rangers' scratches on Sunday was Jesper Fast, who came down with the flu. Fast's absence gave the Rangers' 11 healthy forwards, but that is not including utility man Brendan Smith, who says he's warm to the role of shuttling up to the wing whenever he's asked.
At a time when the Rangers have been scoring in bunches, they face a team against which they have had two of their higher-scoring games this season, scoring six goals in a win on Jan. 15 and five in a loss here back on Oct. 7, in just the third game of the season and the first in which the Rangers dipped their toes in the 11-forward, seven-defensemen waters.
But the Canes have been exceedingly stingy of late, and have caught up to the pack in the Eastern Conference playoff race on the strength of three straight wins, and six wins in their last seven games - three of them by shutout. They also have won eight of their last 10 on home ice and enter Tuesday's game one point back of Pittsburgh and Montreal, who hold the two Wild Card spots in the East.
Eighteen-year-old Andrei Svechnikov, the No. 2 draft choice in 2018, picked up his first NHL goal in that Oct. 7 game against the Blueshirts, and now has 14 of them, good for fifth on his team and third among NHL rookies - four goals ahead of Filip Chytil. Third-year man Sebastian Aho, in his first season playing center, leads the Canes with 67 points (24-43-67), eclipsing his career high in his 58th game.

NUMBERS GAME

Over the last eight years, the Rangers are 26-6 against the Hurricanes. Henrik Lundqvist has 20 of those wins.
The Rangers have scored 18 goals over their last four games, their second such stretch this season. The previous one led into the All-Star break and included a 6-2 Garden victory over the Hurricanes.
The Rangers' power play, 11-for-33 over the last 13 games, is 4-for-9 in the three meetings with Carolina this season.
Mika Zibanejad's goal on Sunday was his 14th in the last 13 games dating to Jan. 15; he is the NHL's leading goal-scorer during that stretch.
The Canes have surrendered two goals in their last three games, and 10 goals in their last seven - half of them in one game alone, a 6-5 OT win in Buffalo on Feb. 7.
Canes rookie Warren Foegele has seven goals this season, three of them against the Rangers.
Carolina is 16-5-1 since Dec. 31. They are trying to end the NHL's longest playoff drought at nine seasons.

PLAYERS TO WATCH

The Rangers' line of Chris Kreider, Mika Zibanejad and Mats Zuccarello have combined in their careers for 25 goals and 66 points in 73 career games against Carolina. Their combined totals this season: four goals, 12 points in nine games played.
Nino Niederreiter continues his hot streak for Carolina: Like Zuccarello, he carries a four-game points streak into Tuesday's game (2-4-6 over that stretch), and Niederreiter has eight goals and 13 points in 13 games as a Hurricane after starting the year with 9-14-23 in 46 games with Minnesota.