Welcome to the 2014-2015 season! The New Blue Review is officially back, as are the New York Rangers starting tonight. We'll have a preview of the game a little bit later, but let's take a look at how the roster shapes up for opening night:
#5 - Dan Girardi (A)
#8 - Kevin Klein
#10 - J.T. Miller
#12 - Lee Stempniak
#13 - Kevin Hayes
#15 - Tanner Glass
#16 - Derick Brassard
#17 - John Moore
#18 - Marc Staal (A)
#19 - Jesper Fast
#20 - Chris Kreider
#21 - Derek Stepan (A) (injured reserve- eligible to return after the 10th game)
#22 - Dan Boyle
#24 - Ryan Malone
#26 - Martin St. Louis (A)
#27 - Ryan McDonagh (C - 27th captain in team history)
#28 - Dominic Moore
#30 - Henrik Lundqvist
#33 - Cam Talbot
#36 - Mats Zuccarello
#44 - Matt Hunwick
#61 - Rick Nash
#62 - Carl Hagelin
#63 - Anthony Duclair
The notables are of course Ryan McDonagh as the new Captain, and the 4 Alternates which will rotate on a game to game basis. Derek Stepan, as stated, is on long-term IR for the first 10 games of the season. The biggest surprise, bar none, is 19 year old Anthony Duclair making the opening night roster. As a 19 year old, the Rangers can keep "The Duke" up for 9 games before sending him back to his Junior team. As an underage player, he can't play in the AHL, so it's sink or swim for the kid.
Some completely worthless but notable roster notes:
Kevin Hayes is wearing #13, only the eighth player in team history to wear the "unlucky number". (As an aside, I pity Jesper Fast - it seems like #19 is far more unlucky, with both Brad Richards and Scott Gomez completely flaming out while wearing that number, and he wore #91 during the pre-season.) The other seven, starting with the most recent, were Dan Carcillo, Nikolai Zherdev, Richard Scott, Valeri Kamensky, Sergei Nemchinov, Bob Brooke, and Jack Stoddard.
Anthony Duclair will be the first player in Rangers history to wear #63.
As long as nothing strange happens in warm-ups injury-wise, the Rangers will be the first team in NHL history to have players wearing #61, #62, and #63 in the same regular season game.
As far as I can see, the scratches for this evening should be Kevin Hayes, Ryan Malone and Matt Hunwick.
Come back for a preview of tonight's game!
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