REGARDING the Rangers, incredibly already on the precipice of a season gone irretrievably wrong:
* Mike Richter’s game is shot, that much is apparent, the shell-shocked goaltender now operating without a shred of confidence while playing behind the most disorganized, least disciplined and worst defensive team in the NHL.
Exactly how much of the blame for this should be assigned directly to Ron Low is debatable, but there is no question that the coach’s inability to control himself from going with No. 35 night after night just seven months after Richter’s major knee surgery surely is a significant factor in the goaltender’s demise.
Imagine having to place an individual on Injured Reserve for battle fatigue, which in essence is what the Rangers did two weeks ago with Richter. That Low, a former NHL goaltender who came from Edmonton with the reputation of being a players’ coach, would have given Richter 21 starts in 23 games including four sets of back-to-backs within 47 days, is inexcusable.
It is also inexcusable for Low to somehow place the blame on Richter for not having come to him to ask out of the lineup. No player should be expected to ever carry that burden. It is the coach’s job to make the lineup, not the players’ responsibility.
And we haven’t quite heard Low criticize Mark Messier for refusing to come out of the lineup when injured, have we?
Richter’s inability to make even routine saves routinely has surely affected the team’s nonexistent confidence. But this is without question a case of the cart following the horse. Perhaps if the Rangers paid even the slightest attention to their play without the puck, Richter’s mechanics might not have deteriorated so dramatically over the last month.
By the way, Vitali Yeremeyev, the 25-year-old flavor-of-the-month who almost certainly would have been recalled from Hartford for Thursday’s game in Phoenix, won’t be coming. Yeremeyev pulled his groin during Friday’s 4-0 shutout of Worcester and will be sidelined for a couple of weeks.
That means it will be either Richter or Kirk McLean against the Coyotes … or Nikolai Khabibulin if Glen Sather can, a) get permission to deal with Phoenix; b) complete a deal for him; c) sign the Group II free agent to a contract, and d) accomplish all this by the day after tomorrow.
* With the Rangers having allowed 46 goals while going 1-7-1-1 in their last 10 games – and having surrendered five goals or more in nine of their last 16 – is it unfair to begin to wonder why Ted Green is considered one of the great defensive minds of the NHL?
* Manny Malhotra has belatedly been recalled from Hartford to take the roster spot belonging to Tim Taylor, who suffered a hip injury when plastered to the wall by Grant Marshall during the first period of Sunday’s give-up 6-1 loss in Dallas.
But there is no more help on the way from the AHL Wolf Pack. There is no size up front on the way. This is because the organization is bereft of the big, physical forwards necessary to win in the NHL.
* The Rangers are now two points behind their pace of a year ago. What’s more, the fact is that even strength with the addition of Messier and the revivals of both Brian Leetch and Theo Fleury, the Rangers have scored only three fewer goals at even than they did through 39 games last year. Through 39 games last season, the Rangers had been outscored 82-79 at even strength; they have been outscored 102-82 at even-strength this year.
* This somehow remains the fault of John Muckler, the mean old man everyone wanted to run out of town last year. This couldn’t have anything to do with Low, whom everybody likes a lot.
This also couldn’t have anything to do with Neil Smith, who is of course the most logical candidate to turn around the Islanders and Panthers.