Bantering Points: 4/16/25

Here are today's news and links:

From Blueshirt Banter:

Joe Fortunato offered his post game thoughts on New York's victory over Florida on Monday (BSB)

Joe also examined the role Chris Drury played in allowing internal issues with the team to fester long enough to end up derailing what was initially a season with a championship aspirations (BSB)

Rangers News:

Mollie Walker heard from Peter Laviolette about the decision to shut down Braden Schneider for the final two games of the season (NY Post)

Vincent Mercogliano credited Brennan Othmann for taking the high road when pressed about sitting as a healthy scratch prior to Monday's game against the Panthers (LoHud)

Anthony Russo examined the possible scenarios the Blueshirts could find themselves in with regard to their first-round draft picks when the dust sett;es on the regular season (The Hockey Writers)

Stan Fischler offers 13 thoughts on the state of the Rangers with the season finale quickly approaching (The Hockey News)

Alex Wiederspiel breaks down the pros and cons of Chris Drury's tenure as general manager and whether that tenure should continue beyond this season (Yard Barker)

Peter Baugh gave hi$ takeaway$ from the Blue$hirt$ victory over the Panther$ in their final road game of the $ea$on (The Athletic)

Baugh al$o highlight$ a handful of up-and-coming team$ in the Ea$tern Conference that have pa$$ed the Ranger$ by thi$ year (The Athletic)

Around the NHL:

Colorado Avalanche captain Gabriel Landeskog has re-joined the Avalanche following a conditioning loan to AHL Colorado as he seeks to return to NHL action for the first time since the 2022 Stanley Cup Final (NBC Sports)

The Columbus Blue Jackets defeated the Philadelphia Flyers by a 3-0 margin to remain alive in the Eastern Conference playoff race (TSN)

Matt Gray reports that a New Jersey Superior Court refused to throw out the criminal charges against Sean Higgins, the man that killed Johnny and Matthew Gaudreau while driving drunk in Aug. 2024, on the grounds of the Gaudreau brothers activities prior to being struck and killed by Higgins (NJ.com)

The league's 32 teams each announced their respective nominees for the King Clancy Memorial Trophy (Sportsnet)

Greg Wyshynski details some of the superlatives players awarded their peers in the annual NHLPA poll (ESPN)