I’m off to catch a train, so I’ll have to chime in with more on the latest debacle in a bit.

Here’s quick summary from the Rangers’ perspective: They did didn’t score early, got frustrated, and then fell apart.

“You can feel the tension and frustration when things aren’t going well,” Drury said. “Maybe if we have that game on the road, it’s 0-0 after two. But we got off page a little bit. And then we started doing things that weren’t in our system.”

Here’s the other possibility: That this is a flawed team that simply came into this afternoon unprepared, and that became more apparent as the game went on.

Updated, 6:38 p.m.: Meanwhile, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that Tom Renney didn’t bite on a question today about Wade Redden.

As long as I’ve been covering the coach, he has refused to single out players who are struggling (the exception being players who Renney has singled out on his own via a benching or a scratch). That a coach chooses not to chastise his players in the press is a mostly admirable trait. But it can be frustrating to reporters who want an answer on a player who has appeared adrift this season. And as much as I like dealing with Renney, it’s part of the reason such questions can be a waste of breath.

“I think it takes on that appearance,” Renney said when asked whether he thought Redden lacks urgency. “I don’t think that’s the case, but it takes on that appearance. Could you not say the same thing about Marc Staal? He’s a calm, cool, collective, poised guy, and I’ve had comments to me that say, ‘Is he engaged? Is he intense?’ I’d have to say yes and so is Wade.”

Of course, most fans would note the difference this season between Redden and Staal is that Staal isn’t beaten to nearly as many pucks, or beaten on as many odd-man rushes. Renney is smart enough to know that difference, too.

Some quick notes before the first MSG matinee of the season.

So just how competitive is Henrik Lundqvist?

Competitive enough that after locking down four points in two games for the Rangers by stopping four of five penalty shots, he was still frustrated enough to break his stick in two when rookie Lauri Korpikoski beat him in practice today (with a phenomenal backhand move, by the way).

And competitive enough that after Tom Renney originally said he would consider putting Stephen Valiquette in net for tomorrow against the Panthers, he’s decided to go back to the King instead.

Granted, the schedule is such that Lundqvist could play tomorrow and still get two days of rest. But even then, when I asked the King about playing back-to-back games against Pittsbugh and Montreal Wednesday and Thursday, he said he’d want to play both of those, too.

“I like to play,” he said.

No kidding.

“We’ll see how he does,” Tom Renney said. “He feels good. He’s well rested. And he’s on top of his game, obviously.”
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At the other end of the spectrum is Petr Prucha, who has been a healthy scratch for nine straight games, and who could be spared a 10th game only because he might be on his way to Hartford on a conditioning assignment.

The plan according to Renney is to talk the issue over with Jim Schoenfeld and Glen Sather this afternoon. Although the coach wouldn’t tip his hand one way or the other, it does sound like some time with the Wolf Pack is in store for Prucha.

“The bottom line is I’d like to get him playing,” Renney said. “And that’s not easy to do when you’re not changing your lineup.”

The plan is for the Rangers to play the same lineup tomorrow.
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So what does an NHL team that has spent pretty much the last three months on skates do for its Christmas party? Why go skating of course.

The Rangers are planning to have their party on Friday at the Museum of Natural History, where they’ll skate at the adjacent rink. I’m told the skating part is really for the kids. But maybe Tom Renney will try to get in some defensive zone work while he’s got everyone there.

We don’t know yet for sure whether Petr Prucha will play tonight against the hapless Panthers, although that sounds like a possibility.

What we do know is that if Prucha plays, expectations should be kept fairly low after eight games out of the lineup.

And that’s the problem. While it’s very possible that Prucha simply isn’t the player he was when he scored 52 goals in his first two seasons in the league, at least some of his regression has to do with how he’s been handled. If he plays tonight or maybe even Sunday and doesn’t do much, chances are he’ll be back in the press box before long. And then his confidence will sag to the point that when he’s thrown back into the fray again, he’s still not going to have much to offer.

Stop me if you’re noticing a trend.

Could a conditioning assignment in Hartford help? Sure. Any player can benefit from playing, especially one who hasn’t seen a puck go off his stick and into the net in what feels like an eternity. But if that was the magic formula, why hadn’t the Rangers considered this earlier? Maybe because they don’t think it’s going to get them much beyond where they are right now.

No, the easiest solution for the Rangers is to simply commit one way or the other: Play Prucha on a regular basis and help him work his way back into serviceable form. Or take whatever it is another team is offering and allow the player the benefit of a fresh start.

The business of hockey is such that you don’t owe your players any special treatment, especially ones that make $1.6 million for basically skating extra sprints after practice. But the team also isn’t doing itself any favors  by allowing the current cycle to continue.

Update, 7 p.m.: No Prucha “tonight after all.”:http://njmg.typepad.com/rangersblog/ The lineup stays the same.

The other day I went around the locker room and asked players what they were thankful for. All of them mentioned their health and their family. A few mentioned hockey.

Me, I’m thankful for a beautiful wife, two awe-inspiring boys, and the fact that I’m healthy enough to still play the game I love. And I’m thankful for this growing and vibrant community of readers who make this blog so rewarding, and who always keep me on my toes (and as Tom Renney likes to say, you’d rather be on your toes than your heels).

Very often at games and in e-mails people reach out me to thank me for all my hard work. It’s a nice thing to say, but it’s also completely unnecessary.

For one, this blog is part of a job that I’m lucky to have. And two, I can assure you I get more out of it than any of you.

One of the habits we all fall into when talking about the Rangers is in talking about their lines in a particular order. Everyone does it, myself included. But I’m not sure we should. Or if we do, I’m not sure we’re always right.

I think we can all agree that the team as its currently constructed has a top two lines, and a bottom two. Beyond that, though, it’s all open for debate.

For instance, is the Rangers’ first line the one that has Scott Gomez at center between Chris Drury and Ryan Callahan? Or is it the one with Markus Naslund and Nikolai Zherdev on either side of Brandon Dubinsky?

You’d say it’s the Gomez line based on Drury and Gomez’s prominent roles, their contracts, and their collective experience. You’d say it’s the other line since Zherdev, Naslund, Dubinsky are currently the team’s top three scorers.

It gets even more complicated with the other two lines. As much as the line of Blair Betts, Colton Orr, and Fred Sjostrom has been used as a classic fourth-line, shutdown unit in the past, that line still got far more ice time on Monday than the unit of Lauri Korpikoski, Aaron Voros, and Dan Fritsche (roughly five minutes more). You’d think that the Korpikoski line would be the one to contribute more offense, but on Monday at least it was Betts who came up with the big first period goal.

Does any of this matter? Probably not, especially this season. One of the Rangers advantages and weaknesses all at once is the relative balance in their lineup. There is no superstar like Jaromir Jagr, who even in a down season last year was still the team’s top-line wing. But there are a lot of interchangeable parts that can be moved around with greater ease.

“Numbers are irrelevant. They really are,” Tom Renney said when I asked him which was the third line and which was the fourth. “They didn’t call Bettsy’s line the number one line in Ottawa when we started them. Everyone contributes.”
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Meanwhile, a sidebar to this is how Renney uses that Betts line, whatever you want to call it. One thing that infuriates perplexes some observers is how the coach will consistently use that line in the first and second period even when the Rangers are down a goal or two (Renney has at least shortened his bench in the third period when the Rangers are behind. He’ll mix in Sjostrom or Betts, but not Orr).

While it’s true that the Rangers’ ability to roll four lines can be at an advantage in wearing teams down over 60 minutes, it does seem like a wasted opportunity to generate needed offense when Renney uses the likes of Orr and Betts as much as he does.

And that is at least one reason the team’s recent stretch of falling behind in games has been so costly. When you fall behind in games you’re forced to press by either a) playing guys who should be on the bench; or b) relying heavily on guys who need more rest.

By taking a lead or at least staying even, you can justify playing all four lines as a means of maintaining a consistent energy.
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The blog is not in Florida—don’t feel too bad, I’ll take Thanksgiving at home with the family over 80 degrees and sunny—but we’ll obviously be monitoring the events tonight and Friday, and we’ll chime in with news when we have it.

Tom Renney was in short sleeves and Aaron Voros was talking up a poker game on the plane. By every measure, the Rangers are ready for their two-game swing through Florida, if only because of how they emerged from their most recent funk last night against Phoenix.

It was a quick, upbeat practice, followed by plenty of banter in the locker room afterward. The plan is to spend tonight and tomorrow night in Tampa, work out there during the day on Thanksgiving, then fly to South Florida where they’ll have a team Thanksgiving dinner on Thursday night.

This would have been the plan regardless of whether they won or lost. But the win last night does remove the sense of gloom that had hovered over the team after the previous two games. Or at least that’s how we saw it. Players said the nature of the schedule is you can’t dwell on any game for too long.

With that in mind, I give you that great 21st century philosopher Brandon Dubinsky:

“It’s tough. You don’t want to make excuses, but every team is going to be helter skelter for a few games. They were tough, no doubt about it. But we have a great resolve in here and a group that sticks together in the best way. We were able to put that behind us and move forward. When you’re winning it’s about not getting ahead of ourselves and thinking we’re better than we really are. And when we’re losing it’s about not thinking we’re the worst team in the league.”

At the end of practices recently, Michal Rozsival has put himself through a standard defenseman drill in which he skates forward with the puck, passes it off to a coach, then accepts a pass back and skates with it backward. He does this several times in a row (I am great at that drill provided I can do it at the slowest possible speed. It’s a different story when you pick up the pace).

While Rozsival has yet to use his offseason hip surgery as an excuse for his mediocre play this season, he did acknowledge the need to continue to work on his skating. I believe it’s all connected. Because Rozsival’s mobility was limited to start the season, he has played poorly, which has affected his confidence…leading to more mediocre play.

Fact is, a guy who was a fairly productive NHL defenseman for most of his career doesn’t turn into a liability overnight without a reason.

“I feel I need to get back to work,” Rozsival said. “Even if the hip feels better, it’s still not strong enough. You have to work on it every day on the ice or off. It’s not just my hip. It helps my overall conditioning just to get a better feel for my skating: to get stronger and more comfortable. It helps your confidence to do a little bit more work. I hope it helps with my game.”

He’s not the only one.
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At various points in his two seasons as a Ranger, Scott Gomez has made references to his own career as a journalist writing for his high school newspaper, The Rolling Thunder.

The subtext has always been the same—that anyone can do what we do standing around asking sweaty athletes questions (he usually does this while also making fun of someone’s clothes).

Maybe that’s true. But just to be sure, I asked Gomez to produce a copy of one of his articles for the Rolling Thunder. I figured he’s not permitted to make fun of newspaper reporters without at least subjecting his own work to scrutiny.

(In fairness, I should mention my own work writing for my high school newspaper, The Garnet and Black, was hardly Pulitzer material. I once wrote a story about our high school hockey team in which I quoted myself. To this day, my favorite interview).

“You know what, I definitely will,” said Gomez, who added he might bring in his high school yearbook as well since he wrote for that, too.

Don’t let me forget this. It’s important.

I made the case before the game last night that Scott Gomez’s return “could have a trickle down effect on the rest of the Rangers lineup”:http://rangers.lohudblogs.com/2008/11/24/the-opponent-is-irrelevant/.

Hey, what do you know, “that was exactly the case.”:http://www.lohud.com/article/20081125/SPORTS01/811250380/-1/SPORTS

I next plan to turn my prognosticating to the financial markets. Who’s with me? Anyone? Hello?

Again, it wasn’t a perfect win by any stretch. Against a promising but ultimately mediocre Phoenix team, the Rangers again surrendered far too many odd-man rushes to start, and if it wasn’t for Henrik Lundqvist, the score after the first period could have been fairly one-sided (I think I’m going to block save that text since I seem to use it a lot).

But—and here the “but” is fairly important—the Rangers finally found way to settle down. Hard forecheck. Good back pressure. Poised decisions with the puck. Lather, rinse, repeat.

How much of an impact did Gomez make? Plenty, actually. Along with his ridiculous run on faceoffs—he finished 19-4—he was the player who consistently steered the puck out of trouble and up ice. Combine that with his upbeat vibe and you forget how important a player Gomez is to the Rangers when he’s healthy—which he hasn’t been for most of the season.
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A lot of worthwhile stories in the paper today on the Great One’s return—I’m talking Gretzky, not Gomez—to the Garden.

Mark Herrmann at Newday chose a different path, “looking at Phoenix rookie Viktor Tikhonov”:http://www.newsday.com/sports/hockey/ny-spmark255941226nov25,0,5974154.column, who is the grandson of the infamous Soviet coach of the same name.
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Meanwhile, Tom Renney’s defensive pairings seemed to make a difference as well, and here’s why: While Michal Rozsival continued to stumble on some isolated plays, last night he had the benefit of Marc Staal backing him up. The result was Rozsival at least seemed to have the confidence to be more decisive with the puck.

Again, he wasn’t perfect. But as opposed to a player who has both gun shy and ineffective in recent weeks, Rozsival was at least as proactive as I’ve seen him in some time.

Besides, whatever you think of Rozsival’s play this season, at least he hasn’t had this happen yet.

According to the offical game stats, Scott Gomez is 17-1 on faceoffs.

Also, the Rangers are ahead 2-1, in case you’re wondering.

More later…

Longtime readers of the blog may already know about my boyhood fascination with Wayne Gretzky since “it’s something I’ve written about in the past”:http://rangers.lohudblogs.com/2006/10/28/wayne-and-me/.

And yet even while acknowledging the extra charge in the building because of the Great One’s presence downstairs—decked in a fairly sharp gray blazer, he was sipping coffee and chatting with a throng of well-wishers—the return of the game’s greatest player to the Garden is only a sidebar in Rangerland. More important to most fans I presume is seeing some sign of life from your wayward team.

Again, no one should pin too much on the return of Scott Gomez. But there is something to be said for the fact that Gomez not only gives the Rangers a jolt on his own, but also takes some of the burden off of the players who were forced to pick up the slack in his absence (i.e. Drury, Naslund, even Dubinsky). But that’s just a working theory. Let’s see if it holds up.
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Like I said above, there was a lot of familiar faces milling around downstairs. Not only is Gretzky back, but so is Don Maloney, as well as Doug Sulliman, the former Ranger first round draft pick who is in his first season as one of Gretzky’s assistant coaches.

I’ve written before about “Sulliman’s unique journey”:http://www.lohud.com/article/20081007/SPORTS01/810070412, going from a career in the NHL, to Wall Street, and now back into coaching under Gretzky. Let’s just say his timing in leaving the financial industry was pretty good, although he claimed it was luck more than anything else.
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Let’s remember that the Coyotes last trip to the Garden was not a pleasant one for the Rangers. In a similar state as they are now, the Rangers were lifeless in a 5-1 loss. I asked Tom Renney if that game had any relevance tonight.

“I’d say no, but I do recall how they played and we watched,” Renney said. “We don’t need that.”

On this many would agree.

More later…