RANGERS VS ISLANDERS GAME DAY PREVIEW 1/13

RANGERS BACK TO WORK VS ISLES AFTER BYE WEEK

New York Rangers (22-15-5) vs New York Islanders (21-18-4)

TODAY 1:00 PM TV: MSG+ RADIO: WEPN 98.7 FM

Madison Square Garden New York City, NY

Both the Rangers and Islanders return from bye week in a Saturday Afternoon Matinee Showdown to start the second half of the 2017-2018 campaign.

The Rangers ended the first half of the season last Sunday with a 2-1 loss in Las Vegas to the Golden Knights while the Islanders won a shootout battle against New Jersey 5-4.

The Rangers get back in the mix hard and fast with back to back games today against the Islanders and tomorrow in Pittsburgh. Including the Isles and Pens the Rangers will play their next five games within seven days.

This is the second of four meetings between the two teams. In the first meeting the Rangers fell to the Islanders 4-3 in the shootout. Jimmy Vesey, Mats Zuccarello and Kevin Hayes tallied the Rangers regulation goals while Zuccarello was the only scorer in the shootout. Henrik Lundqvist stopped 38 of 41 shots on goal through 65 minutes but allowed 2 shootout tallies. Mats Zuccarello scored in the first round of the shootout while both Mika Zibanejad and David Desharnais were stopped on their attempts.

When we left off the Rangers had lost Kevin Hayes to a lower body injury in the first period against Vegas and was listed as day to day following an evaluation in New York on Monday and has a 50/50 chance of playing today.

Both Pavel Buchnevich and Brendan Smith were healthy scratches in the game. Steven Kampfer and Vinni Lettieri were inserted into the lineup, Lettieri picked up an assist on the Rangers lone goal. Lettieri was sent back to AHL Hartford Wolf Pack at the beginning of the bye week with the Pack having games on Wednesday and Friday. Lettieri was recalled yesterday in case Kevin Hayes cannot go.

Rangers first practice after the bye week yesterday, the lines being used were:

JT Miller, Mika Zibanejad, Mats Zuccarello
Rick Nash, Kevin Hayes, Jesper Fast
Michael Grabner, David Desharnais, Vinni Lettieri
Jimmy Vesey, Boo Nieves, Pavel Buchnevich

On defense, the Rangers had Ryan McDonagh paired with Nick Holden, Brady Skjei paired with Kevin Shattenkirk and Marc Staal paired with Steven Kampfer. Paul Carey and Brendan Smith skated as extras.

The Rangers currently sit in fourth place in the Metro Division, 2 points ahead of the last place Islanders and are in 7th place in the Eastern Conference 1 point ahead of the Wild Card Spot Carolina Hurricanes and 2 points ahead of the defending champion Pittsburgh Penguins.

In the last five games the Rangers have a record of 2-3 with three of those games going past regulation time. The Islanders have lost four of their last five games including a 4-0 shutout loss to Pittsburgh last Friday.

TEAM LEADERS

Rangers

POINTS: Mats Zuccarello 31

GOALS: Michael Grabner 18

ASSISTS: Mats Zuccarello 23

Islanders

POINTS: John Tavares 51

GOALS: Anders Lee 25

ASSISTS: Josh Bailey 38