Preview: Zuccarello, Buchnevich Back in Against Coyotes

COYOTES at RANGERS, 7 p.m.MSG2, 1050 AM
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The surroundings were starting to feel a little more familiar to the Rangers on Thursday. Some key players are rejoining the mix, and their calendar is beginning to offer a little more action following a raft of open dates. Oh, and one more thing.
"We're back home," Marc Staal said. "It's a place where we've been comfortable and successful, and we're excited about that."
The Rangers return to Madison Square Garden on Friday night for the first time in nearly two weeks, kicking off a three-game homestand against the ailing Arizona Coyotes. The Blueshirts will see their schedule start to level off after a busy November and a light start to December: They have played just two games over the last 11 days, on the heels of six games in 10 days. And they've skated just once on home ice in the month of December, but now have five of their next six lined up at the Garden.
And they will begin this stretch on Friday night with Mats Zuccarello and Pavel Buchnevich back in their lineup - both forwards took full part in practice in Westchester on Thursday and were declared a "full go" by David Quinn.
Zuccarello has missed 13 of the last 15 games with his groin injury, and his return means the Rangers are getting back, in Kevin Hayes' words, "the heart and soul of our team."

"That's huge. We got Vladdy (Namestnikov) back the last two games, and then Zuc and Boochie back now," Hayes said. "They're a big part of our team, they provide a lot of offense, they make some dangerous lines up and down our lineup. It's exciting to have them back - they're excited and we're excited. So it should be a good time."
Zuccarello first went out following the Nov. 6 game against Montreal, making two short-lived returns in the interim. Buchnevich suffered his broken thumb on Nov. 10 and has missed the last 13 games in a row. "It may take some time - we're going to have to be patient," Quinn said. "They've both been out for a while."
"It's going to take - I don't know how long it's going to take," Zuccarello said. "But a couple shifts and hopefully I'm there."
In the absence of those two, Quinn has tinkered with his lineup perhaps more than usual, not only moving forwards up and down but into different positions as well, including Hayes on the wing and Chytil on the right side, among others.
Among the benefits of having this pair of right wingers return to action is the hope that it will inject some balance and settle the lines a bit.

"We talked a lot about that today: I would love to have some continuity and go with the same lineup and the same lines for an extended period of time," Quinn said. "That would certainly help all of us."
The head coach also believes that the return of two high-end forwards can restore a bit of "swagger" to his team. "When you get two guys back of their caliber, one of the things that can happen is everybody else feels a little more confident," he said. "I think that's been a little bit of our problem, we haven't played with a lot of swagger and a lot of confidence." His Rangers are 2-5-1 following a 9-1-1 stretch.
They are coming off a split of their two-game trip to Florida, in which some lopsided special-teams time cropped up to undercut their strong 5-on-5 play, most markedly against the NHL leaders in Tampa Bay.
"I thought we had two great starts down in Florida - those probably were two of our best periods in a while, the first period against Florida and our first period against Tampa Bay," Quinn said. "As we've talked about since the Tampa game, our penalty situation certainly needs to get better and we've got to put ourselves in a better position to have success, but I really like the last two games with our energy and our physical and mental effort. We've just got to clean some things up."
"I thought against Tampa we were pretty good 5-on-5," added Hayes. "Obviously we gave them too many penalties, and they have an elite power play that kind of exposed us a little bit. But 5-on-5 we worked really hard, and we've got a good goalie that's playing really well. So we can kind of skate with anyone right now."
Hayes finished the trip with four points in the two games, including a pair of goals in Monday's game in Tampa in which he narrowly missed his first career hat trick in the second period. The Rangers got a look at Hayes on the right wing against Florida in the trip opener, before he returned to his natural center position and scored twice against the Lightning. If the points indicate that Hayes may be heating up, he really doesn't see it that way.

"People see two goals and think I'm playing good hockey - it's been the same pretty much all year for me," he said. "It doesn't really change my confidence or have me thinking higher about myself or lower about myself when they're going in."
Henrik Lundqvist should be slated for his fourth straight start, to be backed up by Dustin Tokarski, or on an outside chance Alexandar Georgiev, who made 25 saves In Charlotte on Thursday night in his fourth straight start for the Wolf Pack.
The Coyotes will play their second game of a back-to-back and the third game of a four-game East Coast trip; they come into The Garden on a four-game losing streak, all in regulation, following a 3-1 loss in Buffalo on Thursday night. And while the Rangers get a couple players back from the shelf, the injuries have piled up in Arizona: Alex Galchenyuk (lower body), former Ranger Michael Grabner (eye), Jason Demers (knee) and Christian Dvorak (pectoral) all sat out the Buffalo game; Galchenyuk skated in the morning but couldn't go, while Dvorak has yet to play this season.
And the injuries have Arizona scrambling in goal, too, having lost another ex-Ranger, Antti Raanta, possibly for the remainder of the season to a lower-body injury. Darcy Kuemper returned from injured reserve (lower body) to take the last two starts in goal, making 30 saves in Buffalo, after AHL call-up Adin Hill had started the previous seven straight games. Hill could get the nod on Broadway.

PROJECTED LINEUP

72 Chytil - 93 Zibanejad - 36 Zuccarello
20 Kreider - 13 Hayes - 89 Buchnevich
90 Namestnikov - 21 Howden - 17 Fast
26 Vesey - 16 Strome - 39 Beleskey
18 Staal - 44 Pionk 76 Skjei - 77 DeAngelo
33 Claesson - 42 Smith
30 Lundqvist
31 Tokarski

NUMBERS GAME

The Rangers are opening a three-game homestand against all Pacific Division opponents. Since the start of 2015-16, the Blueshirts are 21-4-1 at the Garden against the Pacific Division.
Through 30 games, the Coyotes have been shorthanded 86 times, second-fewest in the NHL - but when they do go down a man they own the League's top-ranked penalty kill at 90.7 percent. They also have scored a League-high 11 shorthanded goals; New Jersey led the NHL last season with 12 in 82 games.
Arizona is one of two teams, along with Los Angeles, without a player in the top 100 in goals. Clayton Keller leads the way with eight goals (8-13-21).

PLAYERS TO WATCH

Chris Kreider, who leads the Rangers with 14 goals, has scored seven times in seven career games against the Coyotes.
Nick Schmaltz, acquired by Arizona in a Nov. 25 trade with Chicago, has four goals in the Coyotes' last seven games, along with a minus-6 rating in that span.
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