With Sean Avery Injured, Where are the New York Rangers Now?

Not only did the Rangers suffer a frustrating loss last night in Toronto, but one of their players who has actually been playing well lately, Sean Avery, injured his knee during a collision while chasing the puck going into the end boards. He is questionable for Tuesday’s game in Long Island.

Here’s more from Larry Brooks of the NY Post :

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But it came to an end at 12:45 of the second period last night when Avery sustained a right knee injury going into the end boards in a collision with Luke Schenn while chasing to negate an icing following a long Chris Drury pass. Neither player was able to touch the puck as play continued.

Thoughts : Of course this has to happen now. The Rangers have been one of the healthiest teams in the NHL this year, but as they are struggling down the stretch during a desperate attempt at making the playoffs Avery goes down. Without Avery in the lineup this Rangers team goes from mediocre to one that is going to have a hard time defending itself.

Hopefully the rest of the team can actually use this as motivation, particularly Brandon Prust who is probably going to have to step up and fill Avery’s roll. As much as I would like to believe that they will be motivated, it is hard to imagine as Prust has almost no experience killing penalties and this likely will give more ice time to bad players like Aaron Voros .

In reality, this could be good news for those holding out hope that the Rangers will get a better draft pick.

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• March 23, 2010 -- Rangers Keeping Faith but Truth is Bleak (0)

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