The New York Rangers  (17-10-5, 39 points) will play the penultimate game of their road trip this evening against the Chicago Blackhawks (7-18-4, 18 points), and they will look to avenge a 5-2 loss from earlier this month and extend their winning streak to 7 in the process. They take on a Blackhawks team that is 1-13-1 over their last 15 games played, with the lone victory being against the Rangers which snapped an 8-game losing streak. Since that win, Chicago has lost 6 games in a row, the most recent being a 4-1 loss to the Minnesota Wild.

Thus far the Rangers have averaged 3.16 goals per game (17th-best in NHL) while allowing 2.75 against (7th-best) whereas the Blackhawks are scoring at a league-worst rate of 2.31 goals per game while allowing 3.69 goals against per game which is 4th-worst in the league.

Chicago on average allows 33.7 shots against per game, the Rangers allow only 29.3 on average, and the Blackhawks take 25.9 shots per game which significantly less than the 32.7 the Blueshirts are averaging.

Special teams is an area that could be of major importance, and it is an area where there are some similarities at least in terms of place in the league rankings. The Rangers’ PP is clicking at 23.2% which is 12th in the league while Chicago’s is clicking at 23.1% which is 14th in the league.

When it comes to killing penalties, the Rangers have a success rate of 81.4% (7th-best in NHL), while the Blackhawks have a success rate of just 72.0% (6th-worst in NHL).

Obviously the Rangers should be a big favorite in this game, especially considering they will have a rested Igor Shesterkin in net, but Chicago proved earlier this month that on any given day even the worst team in the league can have some success.

Players of Note

Chicago Blackhawks

Leading Scorer: Patrick Kane — 4-18-22 in 28 GP

Top Goal Scorer: Max Domi and Jonathan Toews — 10 goals

Best Goalie: Alex Stalock — 3-2-1, .914 SV%, 2.93 GAA (on Injured Reserve)

New York Rangers

Leading Scorer: Mika Zibanejad and Artemiy Panarin — 35 points

Top Goal Scorer: Mika Zibanejad — 15 goals

Best Goalie: Igor Shesterkin —15-4-0, .917 SV%, 2.45 GAA

With these numbers out of the way, here are the projected lines for both sides which are subject to change.

New York Rangers

Artemiy Panarin — Mika Zibanejad — Barclay Goodrow

Alexis Lafreniere — Filip Chytil — Kaapo Kakko

Chris Kreider — Vincent Trocheck — Jimmy Vesey

Vitali Kravstov — Jonny Brodzinski — Sammy Blais

Ryan Lindgren — Adam Fox

K’Andre Miller — Jacob Trouba

Ben Harpur — Braden Schneider

Igor Shesterkin

Chicago Blackhawks

Sam Lafferty — Max Domi — Patrick Kane

Philipp Kurashev — Jonathan Toews — Taylor Raddysh

Andreas Athanasiou — Jason Dickinson — Mackenzie Entwistle

Colin Blackwell — Jujhar Khaira — Reese Johnson

Jake McCabe — Seth Jones

Jarred Tinordi — Connor Murphy

Jack Johnson — Caleb Jones

Petr Mrazek

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