BRADY HUNCH
Give Skjei shot on right side
REGARDING the Rangers, beginning this sixgame segment before the Jan. 8-12 bye week with Tuesday’s match at the Garden against the Senators:
Alain Vigneault was correct to make Brady Skjei a healthy scratch for Friday’s 7-4 defeat by the Wild, even if the 22-year-old is never not one of the Blueshirts’ top six options on defense and even if the club suffered without him.
Because if the coach detected laziness in the way the rookie played his final shift of the preceding 7-2 defeat in Pittsburgh, and that is believed the case, it was Vigneault’s obligation to get the message across as quickly as possible that such an approach is unacceptable.
Last season, Vigneault made the mistake of adopting a laissez-faire approach to sophomore pro Kevin Hayes’ lethargy that ultimately served neither the team nor the player.
Not this time and not in this case with Skjei, whose game has hit a couple of speed bumps the last few weeks and for whom that example of malpractice on the Penguins’ final goal at 19:49 of the third must be nothing but an aberration. Case closed.
For anyone involved with the Rangers, last season is never far from consciousness. That is why these last two games, and in particular the third period in Pittsburgh and the second period against the Wild, raised so many red flags. The Blueshirts were disconnected and disengaged, their forwards delinquent in their duties without the puck. The work ethic, for the first meaningful stretch this season, was questionable. If it happens again, regardless of the identities of the culprits, Vigneault must act accordingly. Though the Rangers are in a very good spot regarding the playoffs, slip- page in work habits will ensure a return to the rabbit’s hole through which the 2015-16 Blueshirts disappeared.
The Rangers are ninth in the NHL with a 2.44 goals-against average, and remember that is after allowing as many as seven goals in consecutive games for the first time since the first month of the 1987-88 season. Their GAA in opening 13-4 was 2.23. It is 2.62 while going 10-8-1 since. But it was 2.12 through the first 17 games of the second segment before last week’s twin calamities, and that despite a below-average even-strength save percentage of .922 that ranks 18th in the NHL.
There are inferior shotattempt percentages that are reflective both of the team’s rush/perfect-shot style and difficulty escaping its own end on the first (or second) try.
“The Dan Girardi Problem” is not Girardi himself, but Vigneault’s insistence on heaping firstpair, matchup minutes on the 32-year-old as Ryan McDonagh’s partner. True enough, alternatives don’t jump off the page at you (especially if one potential fix would break up the successful Marc Staal-Nick Holden pairing), and the long-term solution to filling this critical spot probably lies with a) sacrificing a youngish top-line-type forward (plus) to acquire a youngish righty with first- pair potential in a trade; and/or b) signing pending unrestricted Kevin Shattenkirk (who will be 28 come July 1) to a Keith Yandlelike, seven-year contract for upward of $6.5 million per year.
But before general manager Jeff Gorton travels down either one of those roads, the Rangers should find out whether Skjei, a lefty, can handle the switch to his off-side he first tried during the second half of last year with AHL Hartford before a pair of games on the right with McDonagh in the playoffs against the Penguins and three on the right with Staal during the middle of last month.
(Note to Gorton: Please, please, please, no draft pick(s) to Buffalo to rent righty Cody Franson, or to Calgary to lease righty Dennis Wideman. Please.)
This may not be the most opportune time for the switch in the immediate wake of both the team’s and Skjei’s struggles. It would be better if both were playing well. But typically that is not when coaches put major changes into place.
No, the Rangers need to find out whether this talented, confident 22-year-old can be a long-term answer on the right … and whether and by how much McDonagh, whose own game had leveled before skidding off the rails last week, would benefit by playing with a more mobile partner.
McDonagh has played 73 percent of his 5-on-5 minutes (440/605) with Girardi; 17 percent with Holden (105); and only 1.4 percent with Skjei (9). McDonagh is the Rangers’ best player. Putting the captain in his best position to succeed is a worthy endeavor.
And Vigneault should make this move even in the unlikely event it costs the team a game or two over the next couple of weeks. The Blueshirts might have to take one step back to take two or three forward either later this season or next season. Not only is there nothing wrong with that, such forward thinking is necessary.