Lots of news coming out of the Rangers first practice back
from the All-Star break and for a change it was all of the positive variety
when it comes to the health of the roster.
Early in practice it was clear that both Ryan
Callahan and Dan Girardi were back and would be playing tomorrow. With the return of Callahan it meant that
there were going to be new lines, which are in the linked story along with my
thoughts on those combinations.
Along with that there was the positive news that Brandon
Dubinsky, Vinny Prospal and Erik Christensen were all taking part in
practice. Originally due to the orange
jerseys they were wearing it was thought they were just there in a non-contact
capacity to take the skate, and do drills, but obviously without contact. Later in practice it was revealed that they
were fully participating in practice which was somewhat surprising for all
three. In terms of Dubinsky it has only
been two weeks since he was said to be out a month with a stress fracture. For Prospal he had yet to take part in a
contact practice this season. With
Christensen there was no set time on when he would be back practicing.
The good news only got better as following practice Dubinsky,
Prospal, Christensen and Fedotenko were all given scheduled return dates or
timetables on when to expect them back in the lineup. All four are expected back in short order
with one possibly against the Pens and one definitely against the Devils.
Other than all of that good news there were a couple stories
on the site today. The morning I took a
look at eight
keys to keep the Rangers in the playoffs these last 30 games. Half of the list consisted of things that the
team needed to sustain from the first “half” and the rest were things that
needed to improve. One of them is
already looking much better and they have not even played a game yet.
The other story was about Marc
Staal, Vinny Prospal and the “A” that Staal got when the Rangers realized
Prospal was going to be out long term.
Based on certain things it appears that the “A” is going to go back to
Prospal as soon as he is in the lineup, but should it?
