Blueshirts Impress With a Loss, NYR 1, Bruins 2

The 'new' New York Rangers opened the pre-season last night against the Boston Bruins and certainly held their own.  Our Blueshirt squad consisted mostly of prospects vying to impress coach John Tortorella in making the starting team, with only three or four slots that may be in question.  Visibly absent was our center Brandon "Dumb-ie" Dubinsky, but they counted on Ryan Callahan to pick up the tempo when necessary.  Most of our starters were a scratch with the exception of our dear Captain Drury, newbie Kotalik (who demonstrated what might become of the power play), Christopher Higgins and the 'much-booed' Donald Brashear.

Official recap here.

Though a loss (that doesn't count), there were impressive performances by both Matt Gilroy and Michael Del Zotto, who if they continue to play throughout the pre-season as they did last night, will certainly find themselves professional Rangers come opening day.  Both were impressive, confident and strong --- and most important to Torts - forward moving blueliners. For anyone not watching the pre-season games, I would highly recommend you watch these two rookies, Michael Del Zotto at 19 years of age plays an aggressive game and wasn't backing down from Boston's Lucic -- "please the coach, please the coach..." - a very different style than former coach Tom Renney.  Matt Gilroy at 25 years of age, looks as solid as Blueshirts Dan Girardi and Marc Staal.  Missing, though, is our "stay at home" defensive stud.  Chris Pronger would have been nice.  Higgins and Kotalik were extremely impressive on the point, and will certainly make a difference in the power play.

As to be expected, the first period was sloppy and dribble - in other words, a pre-season debut - but the Blueshirts picked up the tempo in the second and third periods, controlling the last half of the game. 

I actually enjoyed last night and look forward to tonight against the NJ Devils -- as we've all read that NJ's Jamie Langenbrunner has been scratched in place of Brendan Shanahan tonight (look out for that upcoming trade, folks...ha ah ah aha h ).   MSG at 7pm.

tdr