Carolina Hurricanes at New York Rangers: Lineups and Game Discussion

Carolina travels to New York tonight to take on a Rangers team that isn’t contending for a trophy, but has crushed the Hurricanes so far this season, winning the first two games by a combined 11-2.

The biggest news comes in the form of a much-awaited call up. Valentin Zykov, the AHL leader in goals (30 in 57 GP), will be with the team tonight, but it’s uncertain where he’ll fit in or if he’ll even touch the ice. Bill Peters said there wouldn’t be any lineup changes from the last game, a 3-2 win at Chicago.

Update 5:20 pm with confirmation:

Peters announced yesterday that tonight’s game would be another go for Scott Darling (11-16-7/3.06 GAA/.890 SV). Darling started in the previous two games against NYR, allowing nine goals on 51 shots, so he’ll be looking for revenge.

Here are the lines from last game at Chicago:

Teuvo Teravainen - Jordan Staal - Sebastian Aho
Brock McGinn - Elias Lindholm - Justin Williams
Jeff Skinner - Victor Rask - Phil Di Giuseppe
Joakim Nordstrom - Derek Ryan - Lee Stempniak

Jaccob Slavin - Brett Pesce
Klas Dahlbeck - Justin Faulk
Noah Hanifin - Trevor Van Riemsdyk

Scott Darling
Cam Ward

The Rangers shipped out big names like Ryan McDonagh, Rick Nash and J.T. Miller at the deadline, so they feature a couple new names from the last time the Canes met them, including former Tampa Bay young gun Vladislav Namestnikov.

Not much news on the Rangers lines. Coach Alain Vigneault said lineup changes will be game-time decisions, including David Desharnais, who missed Saturday’s game against the Panthers with kidney stones. All Rangers skated in morning skate, though, so anything is a possibility.

Vigneault did say that Alexandar Georgiev (1-2-0/2.65 GAA/.930 SV) will start in net for the Rangers. Georgiev was signed this summer, and got his first start on Feb. 22 against Montreal.

Here’s what we expect to see, based on the Rangers’ last game:

Chris Kreider - Mika Zibanejad - Jesper Fast
Ryan Spooner - Kevin Hayes - Mats Zuccarello
Jimmy Vesey - Vladislav Namestnikov - Pavel Buchnevich
Cody McLeod - Peter Holland - Paul Carey

Marc Staal - Neal Pionk
Rob O’Gara - John Gilmour
Brady Skjei - Anthony DeAngelo

Alexandar Georgiev
Henrik Lundqvist