Henrik Lundqvist had a busy night on Thursday, facing 47 shots from the Jets in the opening 6-4 victory that represented the 450th of his NHL career.
But that is not the reason the King wiꦡll take a back (up) seat to Alex Georgiev at Ottawa on Saturday.
“It was ꧒the plan, regardless,” coach David Quinn said in naming the 23-year-old sophomore as his starter. “Just big picture.
“We only play three games in 17 days, I don’t want Georgie sitting a long time. You know, again, this is an 82-game season and there w♒as a lot of work for Hank, but this is the way we’d been looking at it for a while.”
The Rangers last split opening assignmen🧜ts through their first two games in 2014-15, when Cam Talbot got the nod in Game 2 after Lundqvist played the opener. Georgiev received his first start last year in Game 3.
Quinn vowed to get Lias Andersson more ice time than the 8:33 the fourth-line center got in the 😼opener, in which he sat 𓄧for the final 13:11.
Andersson’s night began badly when he tripped over 🌄a camera cable during the pregame introductions and never got all that much better, with the Swede deficient 🐬on Mark Scheifele’s goal from tౠhe slot that tied it 1-1 in the first and on Kyle Connor’s power play goal in the third that lifted Winnipeg to a 4-3 lead.
“I have a theory, but I want to keep the conversation between Lias and I [private] about what happened🅰 last night,” the coach said. “H༺e’ll play more.”
Ryan Strome went 9-4 at the dots in the opener, the best mark by far among the Rangers, with Mika Zibanejad 11-12, Brett Howden 4-10 (but with the win that created his owꦛn game-winner at 15:51 of the third), and Andersson 1-3.
Following Satꦇurday’s game, the Blueshirts are off until nex🍌t Saturday afternoon, when the Oilers come to the Garden. Then there is a break until the next Thursday, Oct. 17, when the Rangers play host to the Devils before playing at Washington the following night.