As seems to be the case consistently now, lots of news
coming out of New York Rangers practice today.
The first bit of news concerns Vinny Prospal and where he will play
tomorrow in his return to the lineup.
Steve Zipay
passed along the news that Vinny Prospal skated on a line with Marian
Gaborik and Derek Stepan. Following practice it was confirmed that
Prospal will play against New Jersey.
Not surprising to see Torts go to Prospal in an attempt to get Gaborik
going, and will certainly have more on that tomorrow.
The other lines in practice were
Mats Zuccarello – Brian Boyle – Brandon Prust
Wojtek Wolski – Chris Drury – Sean Avery
Erik Christensen – Kris Newbury – Artem Anisimov
As you can see there are two big names missing from those
lines and there were moments of angst amongst those following the beat writers
on twitter when they passed along the news that both Ryan Callahan and Brandon
Dubinsky were missing from today’s practice.
Personally I was more surprised to see Callahan not out there than
Dubinsky following the way the two played last night, but by the time practice
was over the fears had been alleviated.
Both players according to
Andrew Gross will play tomorrow despite being out today. The two were given a “maintenance day” as
Callahan was sore from the Letang cross-check and Dubinsky from his flip during
the game.
According to Peter
Botte , Ruslan Fedotenko had his injury troubles added to when he had his
appendix removed. The original timetable
for his return was by the end of next week, but now Botte is saying that it is
likely 3-4 weeks before he can return.
That timeline would push the return of Fedotenko to likely after the
trade deadline. Wishing Feds the best in
surgery and recovery.
In other injury news Christensen is still said to be about a
week away.
