Rangers Open the New Year Against the Hurricanes

After splitting the Florida road trip to conclude 2023, the Blueshirts return to Madison Square Garden to host the Hurricanes for the first test of 2024 (7:00 P.M. on MSG).

Rangers	Rankings	Hurricanes
25-9-1	Record	20-13-4
1st	League Rank	10th
10th	Goals For	12th
7th	Goals Against	15th
1st	Power play	5th
5th	Penalty Kill	10th

Previous Game

New York is coming off a 5-1 victory over the Tampa Bay Lightning. Artemi Panarin was the story to close the year as he recorded a hat trick against his fellow Russian – Andrei Vasilevskiy. Panarin was named the second star of the week in the National Hockey League (NHL). Igor Shesterkin recorded his 15th win of the season on his birthday by making 34 saves.

Rangers vs Hurricanes

The Blueshirts will now turn their attention to the Carolina Hurricanes who sit second in the Metropolitan Division. The Hurricanes trail the Rangers by seven points despite playing in two more games. With a win for the Rangers tonight, they would find themselves with a nine point gap between themselves and Carolina as we get closer towards the halfway point of the season.

An interesting player to keep an eye on in Tuesday night’s game is Sebastian Aho. The Hurricanes star center has 42 points in 35 games. The Finnish center was the NHL’s first star of the week this past week as he recorded eleven points in the past three games. Aho is currently on a four-game point scoring streak.

But perhaps even more interesting than Aho’s recent point surge is what happened between the two teams in the beginning of November. Aho was involved in a collision with Rangers defenseman Adam Fox. Fox left the game and would miss the next ten games with a lower-body injury. Aho didn’t want to answer the bell then – so it will be interesting to see if this game gets feisty and if the Rangers try to go after Aho.

The biggest issue for the Hurricanes this season has been their goaltending. Despite giving up the fewest shots against per game in the NHL with 25.8, their goaltenders have struggled to make saves. Goaltender Frederik Andersen has played in just six-games as he has been dealing with blood clots. Andersen has resumed skating and will likely be able to see game time later this month. Antti Raanta has struggled mightily this season after being dependable for most of his career. Raanta has an .855 save percentage and he was eventually placed on waivers. The 34-year-old went unclaimed and played in the American Hockey League for a little while to try and get his game back. Raanta’s career save percentage is .915.

Pyotr Kochetkov will be in goal for the Hurricanes as they look to find stability in the net. Kochetkov is 9-7-3 with a .900 save percentage. He figures to oppose Shesterkin – his former teammate in Russia. Kochetkov has won his previous two games making 60 saves on 64 shots.

Filip Chytil has returned to the Czech Republic as he continues to recover from a concussion suffered early into the season.

“Fil is progressing slowly,” said Rangers head coach Peter Laviolette to the media. “It’s an opportunity for him to head home, reset, [and] continue to move forward.” Chytil will use this time to “reset” and be with his family. Laviolette said he can return at some point this season.

Kaapo Kakko had a better prognosis from Laviolette as he inches closer to returning to the lineup.

“He’s moving in the right direction,” Laviolette said. “Skating on his own right now and progressing.”

The one advantage the Rangers have entering Tuesday’s game is the fact that it will be on home ice. Usually, that doesn’t make much of a difference if any, but the Hurricanes have struggled on the road. New York is 12-4-0 on home ice whereas Carolina has ten of their 13 regulation defeats coming when they are away from home ice.

The bet of the night – Jacob Trouba to record over 2.5 blocked shots. The Hurricanes average the fourth most shots per game in the league and Trouba has been over this line in three of the previous four games. A $5 bet at -125 will win $9 for a $4 profit.

Current record: 12-7

Current Money Total (Based on $5 bets) – We are up $36 on the season