I guess you could call it a goaltending overhaul today at Rangers practice, with two new - newish? - faces in the nets. Weather-waylayed Henrik Lundqvist was back in Ranger red, white and blue at one end while Alex Auld was wearing his green-and-white Dallas Stars mask at the other, the first sign that maybe the Rangers’ PR staff has written its last Chad Johnson/Matt Zaba transaction press release for the season.
In between the two goalies, it was the full complement of skaters (save for the two Olympians who played in last night’s bronze-medal match and the two who will skate for the United States in today’s gold-medal game), and that included Michael Del Zotto, who got his stitches out this morning and was on the ice some 20 minutes later. Del Zotto, skating for the first time in 16 days since being cut by Evgeni Malkin’s skate blade, did sit out the contact drills that came at the end of practice and is still questionable for Tuesday’s game in Ottawa, but the rookie blueliner stayed on the ice for nearly an hour and a half to be bag-skated by Mike Sullivan and Jerry Dineen. Sixteen days off: welcome back, son.
“It was really good, I was surprised,” Del Zotto said after catching his breath in the dressing room. “I didn’t know how I was going to be able to shoot because it’s in that area, left D coming across. I was really surprised, it was a good day … (with) everything. My legs felt good.”
Del Zotto has been fitted with an undershirt that has a hard protective pad sewn in to cover the area of the cut. With the stitches out, there is no worry at this point about reopening the cut; rather, the pad is there to protect a wounded area that still gives Del Zotto some pain, and also to help with the mental aspect that the rookie admitted does exist. “The pain” is what would keep him from playing on Tuesday, Del Zotto said, adding that he isn’t worried about his timing being rusty. After all, over the past two weeks he has only sat out one game. “When you see someone running down at you on the forecheck, you’ll know you’re back,” he said.
Lundqvist knows he’s back because of the disappointment he felt when Sweden’s defense of its Olympic gold ended at the hands of Marian Gaborik and the Slovaks last week, a defeat the goaltender said he has tried to put behind him - with limited success. “It was great, it was fun environment, great city for the Games I think,” Lundqvist said. “We started off pretty good, but then, again, it comes down to one game, and the things that could go wrong for us did go wrong.”
The trip home into a nor’easter wasn’t much better. Lundqvist’s plane home on Thursday was in its descent into New York when plans changed and the flight was diverted to Toronto. He spent two extra nights in Toronto and didn’t arrive back until yesterday.
Auld was a recent arrival, too, having been picked up off reentry waivers from the Dallas Stars on Saturday. He had known for a few weeks that there was the possibility he could be moved from Dallas - ever since the Stars swiped Keri Lehtonen from Atlanta - but “I was hoping it was an NHL team and I wasn’t going to end up in Austin in the AHL,” he said. “I heard Saturday morning that there was the potential to come here, and frankly I got really excited. Always loved the city, loved playing in the building, and it gives me a chance to work with Benoit Allaire and play with one of the best goalies in the world - all those things are good. I’m eager to learn, hopefully find a home. Obviously it’s an adjustment coming to the big city, but it’s exciting.”
Auld - who has joined his seventh team in eight NHL seasons - said he was thankful to Stars GM Joe Nieuwendyk for at least being upfront with him about his situation in Dallas, and for placing him on recall waivers for the chance to land somewhere else. Auld played with Olli Jokinen on the 2006-07 Panthers and said he knows Marc Staal’s family well from growing up in Thunder Bay, Ontario.
The other thing he said he knows: “I understand the other guy that’s in net most nights, and how good he is. I just want to help”
COOL!