DeAngelo injury will slow growth
The still unspecified damage to Tony DeAngelo’s left ankle he suffered crashing into the Garden boards 7:22 into the second period of Monday’s 6-3 victory over Carolina is at least equaled by the damage to his development that will be caused if, as seems likely, he is sidelined for the remainder of the season.
“It’s not going to help,” said coach Alain Vigneault, who will have AHL recall Ryan Sproul in DeAngelo’s spot for Wednesday’s Broadway matchup against the Penguins. “It’s unfortunate, but injuries are part of the game, players get them, and they’ve got to work real hard with the right mindset to get themselves back in the groove.
“But I do think that in the short amount of time that he was here, he was making some positive strides in his game, understanding the game, and coming along for us as a good right-handed D. And that righty-lefty combination, in seeing [Neal] Pionk with Marc [Staal], or Tony with Marc or with Brady [Skjei], is something that permits us to get better touches on the back end with the puck and something we should look at moving forward, that righty-lefty combination.”
Vigneault has always been a devout believer in the advantages of defensemen playing their natural, strong side. This year, though, lefty Nick Holden played the right in 46 of his 55 games before the trade to Boston; lefty Brendan Smith played the right in 25 of his 44 games before being dispatched to the AHL Wolf Pack; lefty Marc Staal played the right 10 times; and freshman lefty John Gilmour has played the right in nine of his last 10 matches.
In other words, this wasn’t a Dan Girardi-Kevin Klein-Anton Stralman right-handed depth chart from which Vigneault could draw.
Regarding Gilmour’s use on his offside, Vigneault first said (with a laugh), “I don’t have any other options,” before adding, “Gilly for me has really stood out in his skating ability, and his skating ability with the puck to get away and get out from our end … after that he has to learn to make the right plays, and I feel that’s coming along, but I would say he looks more comfortable on the left side.”
DeAngelo, acquired with the seventh-overall selection in last year’s draft from Arizona in exchange for Derek Stepan and Antti Raanta, opened the season with the Rangers and got into eight games before he was sent to Hartford on Oct. 24. His demotion left the Blueshirts and Vigneault with Kevin Shattenkirk and oft-scratched Steven Kampfer as blue-line righties.
Shattenkirk, sidelined since Jan. 8 while rehabbing from left knee surgery, has been shut down for a few days by the medical team following what Vigneault referred to as “a minor setback.” The Rangers are putting no pressure whatsoever on No. 22 to return this season, but Shattenkirk himself wants to get back to generate some relative peace of mind heading into the summer.
The offensively gifted DeAngelo clearly had been making an effort to play a more complete game while limiting his excesses and flights of fancy since his mid-January recall that coincided with Shattenkirk’s departure from the lineup.
“He’s been coming along. You see the skill level with the puck,” Vigneault said. “With Tony, it’s like a lot of young players. It’s a matter of understanding the game, what plays to make that are right for the situation, and improving his overall knowledge of the game with and without the puck.”
The 22-year-old Angelo, whose results from the morning MRI had not been released as of Tuesday evening, once seemed on the express train to NHL success following his first-round, 19th-overall selection by Tampa Bay in 2014. But off-ice issues and on-ice matters of temperament turned his route into a local with rerouted stops in the desert and on Broadway.
And now, through no fault of his own, his progress has been derailed at least for the short-term. Shattenkirk is ahead of him on the 2018-19 depth chart scribbled in invisible ink, so is Pionk, and so is whatever veteran righty the Blueshirts add through a trade or free agency, as they surely will. Tough blow for the kid. Tough blow for the Rangers.
Alexandar Georgiev will get his second consecutive start in nets when the Blueshirts meet the Penguins at the Garden on Wednesday.
“He’s a battler, I like his positioning and rebound control, he’s won his last two games,” coach Alain Vigneault said. “But at the end of the day, for us right now, it’s about ‘Do we have a young potential backup for [Henrik Lundqvist]?’ We’ll see what he can do against a real good team.”
Georgiev, the 22-year-old who signed last summer as a free agent, is 2-2 in five games (and four starts) with a .930 save percentage and 2.73 goals against average. He has been unfazed by his rapid ascension to the NHL, hastened by Ondrej Pavelec’s Feb. 9 knee injury, a year after playing in the Finnish League.
“He’s a calm kid, technically very good,” Lundqvist said. “These kids coming up now, they learn technique from age 8 up. That’s different from me, I was learning technique when I was 19 and 20.”
Georgiev is the first Bulgarianborn player to make it to the NHL. He was a year old when his family moved to Moscow.
“There are no good hockey teams in Bulgaria,” the goaltender, who backstopped Russia to the silver medal at the 2016 World Junior tournament, told The Post.
The Blueshirts have 12 games remaining including this one against the two-time defending Cup champs whose chances at a three-peat were enhanced with the trade deadline acquisition of Derick Brassard, aka Big Game Brass. Georgiev will get his share of the action the rest of the way.
“We need to find out about this young goaltender, who seems to have some good upside,” Vigneault said.
➤ Georgiev is the 17th understudy of Lundqvist’s tenure and the 14th to get into a game. Al Montoya, Jason Missiaen and David LeNeveu also dressed as backups since 2005-06 but did not play for the Rangers.
Lundqvist was one of six players — with Georgiev, Cody McLeod, Peter Holland, David Desharnais and Paul Carey — on the ice for what was publicly designated as an “optional” practice.