Following their six-game elimination of the Carolina Hurricanes last Thursday, the New York Rangers returned to their grind. Blake Wheeler and Filip Chytil skated around the rink looking like real options in the Eastern Conference Final on Sunday during a well-attended optional skate at the MSG Training Center.
Head coach Peter Laviolette gave the team’s preparations for the Florida Panthers some insight into what lies ahead, starting on Wednesday at Madison Square Garden.
Rangers are overcoming hardships to face the hurricanes.
“They’ve been a top team in the league after playing for the Cup last year and winning their division,” Laviolette remarked. They offer quickness. They contribute bulk. They provide both physicality and skill.
“There are certain parallels between Carolina and their aggressive style of play. Thus, while there will be some preparation that is comparable, there will also be some differences. We’re only now getting started and giving it to the boys so they can get ready.
It’s on to the fifth-best club after eliminating the Hurricanes, who finished the regular season with 111 points, making them the third-best team in the NHL. The Panthers and Winnipeg Jets both had 110 points, but the Jets needed four more regulation victories to break the tie.
In other words, things only get harder from here.
Laviolette said, “Every team is going to present different challenges, so we just have to be ready.”
According to the latest odds, the Panthers (much like the Hurricanes) will open this series as the favorites. This shouldn’t come as a shock, considering the Rangers opened the season outside of the top five by most oddsmakers.
While the lack of respect is bound to continue should the Rangers get to the Stanley Cup Final, Florida’s run in 2022–23 is weighing in their favor. Although they lost five games to the Vegas Golden Knights, the experience they garnered is invaluable.
One area that stands out is that the Panthers actually averaged more shots on goal per game than the Hurricanes (33.7 to 33.3) during the regular season. This was certainly a challenge for the Blueshirts against the Hurricanes, and an area they’ll need to manage better.
However, the physicality between the two teams is vastly different, as Florida led the NHL in hits with 2,339. That’s an average of 28.23 hits per game compared to Carolina’s meager 16.69, which was dead last. It’s also noteworthy to mention that the Rangers are physical themselves, averaging 23.89 hits per game.
Of course, increased physicality comes with a price, not just for the opposition absorbing the hits. Florida was the most penalized team at 1,116 minutes for the 2023–24 campaign. They led the league in misconducts at 23, and averaged 5.01 penalties per game. In contrast, the Rangers only took 3.64 penalties per contest.
The Panthers have five rambunctious forwards that need to be watched closely. Ryan Lomberg (2.10), Sam Bennett (1.78), Kevin Stenlund (1.59), Nick Cousins (1.50), and Matthew Tkachuk (1.33) are tops on the team in penalties taken per 60 minutes of play (min 40 games played). Looking at the Rangers, only two players in total averaged more than one penalty per game: Barclay Goodrow (1.40) and Will Cuylle (1.20).
That’s why the Rangers power play will be crucial in this series. They cannot afford to go three games without a power-play goal against the Panthers, as they did versus the Hurricanes.
“It wasn’t in a rut,” Laviolette explained of the brief drought in Games 3, 4, and 5. “We were playing an extremely good penalty kill. One that had been really good for the entire year, and to think we would score three goals a game is the wrong thought process to have. You hope that the power play can make a difference in the series, and I think they did.”
In hindsight, Laviolette is correct, as the Rangers finished with a 26.3 success rate against Carolina. In these playoffs to date, New York is operating at a 31.4%, ranked second only to the Edmonton Oilers (36.8%) of all remaining teams in the postseason.
At the end of the day, this team understands that winning in the Stanley Cup playoffs is going to come down to controlling your own emotions. They will need that, as the Panthers will surely be looking to get in their faces from the drop of the puck in Game 1.
“During the course of a playoffs, you’re going to find yourself with some highs and lows,” Laviolette explained. “You’ve got to figure out how to move on from those lows. All of it, in the long run, puts some scars on you and makes you tougher. It’s naive to think you’re going to score three power-play goals every single game. It’s naive to think we would win every game. It’s what you do when you don’t have success, and how you respond makes you a little bit tougher to give you what you need to keep going.”