Lemieux suspended two games

So the number of games the depth-challenged Rangers will be without Brendan Lemieux for the qualifying series against Carolina is two.

That’s the length of the harsh, but neither unfair nor unreasonable, suspension the NHL has handed down in the aftermath of the winger’s gratuitous elbow to the head of Colorado’s unsuspecting winger Joonas Donskoi at 17:08 of the third period in the Rangers’ 3-2 overtime defeat in Colorado, the club’s final game on March 11.

Chances are Lemieux, who is considered a repeat offender after having previously been suspended while with Winnipeg for an elbow to the head of Florida’s Vincent Trocheck in a Nov. 2, 2018 match in Helsinki, would have received a five-game regular-season sentence. If one applies the informal and unwritten one-for-three rule, then Lemieux could perhaps have escaped with only missing the Aug. 1 opener.

But the league was not likely to give the benefit of the doubt to Lemieux, who was fined $2,000 earlier this season for an elbow to the head of Cody Glass in Las Vegas. If the suspension was harsh, it was surely within the margin of error.

The Rangers, of course, knew they would start without the fourth-line left wing, who had been at his most effective in months while combining with linemates Greg McKegg and Julien Gauthier in a previous iteration. The Blueshirts have changed their alignment practicing post-COVID-19 without No. 48 in their top 12. Howden has worked with McKegg and Lemieux while Phil DiGiuseppe flipped down to the third unit in order to accommodate Chris Kreider’s return from the injury list.

But that’s it. Combined with the topheavy first two units anchored one-two, two-one (or is that, one, too?) by presumptive Hart finalist Artemi Panarin and the splendid Mika Zibanejad and the third line that becomes so much more dangerous and credible if Kaapo Kakko can carry the urgency and pace he displayed during the first week of practice into the tournament, that’s the entirety of the varsity without Lemieux.

It surely remains to be seen whether David Quinn, who hadn’t quite found a meaningful purpose for the fourth line in nearly two years until the Blueshirts acquired Gauthier from Carolina on Feb. 18 and placed him in the lineup the following night, has the depth to withstand a significant injury and still make a meaningful run.

This was evident when Pavel Buchnevich was absent from Sunday’s scrimmage after leaving midway through Saturday’s practice with a non-virus related issue. Kakko moved up to the first line, Gauthier to the third and Steve Fogarty up onto the fourth line. Tim Gettinger would presumably be next.