With five games remaining on the regular season calendar, the Rangers woke up Sunday morning with a five-point lead over the Hurricanes in the Metropolitan Division and one point ahead of the Bruins, who are chasing first place in the Eastern Conference. There is.
They still lead the entire NHL with 108 points.
Since early March, the Blueshirts have outscored their opponents 66-47 and have not lost two straight during that span.
Winning has come in all forms, most recently for teams in the bottom six, with the Rangers scoring a total of three goals in a 4-3 win in Detroit.
“We need everyone for the playoffs,” Barclay Goodrow said. He has three points in four games after scoring twice on Friday. “You can’t rely on your top six every night to make your offense successful. I’m glad I could help.”
The 12th and final forward spot in the Rangers’ playoff lineup appears to be decided by Johnny Brodzinski and Matt Lempe, two fourth-line skaters who give the team two different looks each time they play.
On one side, there’s the speedy Brodzinski, who proved his secondary scoring ability with a career-high 19 points in 54 games during his longest stint as an NHL regular.
On the other hand, Rempe has chaotic powers. Rempe has been a healthy scratch in four of the last five games, and he hasn’t had much of a chance to show his true potential while being protected on the ice.
Just because one starts Game 1 of Round 1 doesn’t mean the other won’t start Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Final.
That being said, it will be important for Rangers to have the bottom six teams in place for maximum success. On Friday, manager Peter Laviolette moved Goodrow to the left wing with Brodzinski and Jimmy Vesey to try a different style, and this line certainly gave the Rangers’ head coach something to think about.
“I like it,” Goodrow said of playing on the wing. “This is a bit of a change for me because I’ve been good the last three years. I’ve been playing center pretty consistently this year, so it was nice to make the switch. But as far as playing center, I think we’re pretty compatible. We didn’t change much, but we had a lot of fun.”
Goodrow, Brodzinski, and Vesey had an expected goals percentage of 76.04, second only to the solid unit of Artemi Panarin, Vincent Trocheck, and Alexis Lafreniere, and posted an 81.91 xGF%.
The fourth line led all Rangers with a touchdown time of 10 minutes, 58 seconds, outscoring opponents 8-5.
This is a small sample size and could grow even more over the next week and a half, but early signs indicate this could be a good starting point for the playoffs.
Rempe should definitely get some games in this final stretch. If only to see what the 6-foot-8 1/2 forward looks like with a normal workload and steady reps.
Even if Rempe isn’t in the postseason starting lineup, Laviolette knows what kind of impact the 21-year-old rookie can have on the game.
He could be a tool in Laviolette’s back pocket.
“I think from the beginning we just put the puck behind guys and forechecked, and I think that worked,” Vesey said Friday of what worked for his line. Ta. “Maybe the first game was a little shaky, but the rest of the game I thought we played well, played simple and showed great looks.”
