Why Rangers will face mostly minor-leaguers against Devils in back-to-back preseason games

GREENBURGH – The New Jersey Devils left on Sunday for Prague, Czechia, where they will open their regular season with games against the Buffalo Sabres Friday and Saturday.

But a team of guys wearing Devils jerseys will play the Rangers in a preseason game Monday in Newark and Tuesday at the Garden. That means, as the Rangers try to make final decisions on their roster, and fine-tune their game to get ready for the regular season, they will be facing a minor-league team in two of their final three preseason games.

“Yeah, but it's not like we're playing against beer league players out there,’’ Rangers center Vincent Trocheck said after Sunday’s double-session practice. “I mean, these are professional hockey players also, right? And a lot of times, the difference between a guy in the AHL and the guy the NHL is just an opportunity. It's not like we're going into it thinking that, you know, we’re playing against an AHL team.

"You're trying to focus on yourself and see what you can do to get better, and make sure that you're ready to play Game 1 of the regular season.’’

“It's obviously going to be different, and we're still in an evaluation process, no matter which players we choose to play,’’ coach Peter Laviolette said. “It's still training camp and it's still a chance to evaluate. So we'll use it for exactly what it is, what it's been in the first three games, and what it'll remain in the last three games.’’

When it was suggested to Laviolette that the players he is trying to evaluate won’t be going up against NHL players, he said, “If you think that (a candidate to make the team)'s that good, then you should dominate, right?’’

The Rangers still have 43 players in camp, so they’ll likely dress a mostly AHL-level lineup, at least for Monday’s game. They do still need to adhere to the NHL’s rule that requires preseason lineups to feature eight NHL “veterans,’’ defined as skaters who played 30 or more NHL games last season, or 100 or more in their career, or goalies who dressed for 50 NHL games last season.

With the back-to-back, there won’t be many – if any – players who play both games against the Devils, so most of the veterans who need work will probably play in Tuesday’s game, the last home preseason game.

Igor Shesterkin has only played half of one game so far in the preseason, and he’ll likely need two more appearances – one for two periods, and the other for a whole game – within the last three games. The Artemi Panarin-Trocheck-Alexis Lafreniere line has only played one preseason game, as have defenseman K’Andre Miller and fourth-line center Sam Carrick.

Blue notes

Forward Jimmy Vesey left practice after taking a fall during a drill and getting up limping. But Laviolette said Vesey’s fall “seemed somewhat harmless.’’ … After practicing with the B group Friday, forward Adam Edstrom was back with the A group Sunday, while Brennan Othmann moved down to the B group … D Victor Mancini skated for the second straight practice as a partner to Adam Fox.

By Colin Stephenson

colin.stephenson@newsday.comColinSNewsday

Colin Stephenson covers the Rangers for Newsday. He has spent more than two decades covering the NHL and just about every sports team in the New York metropolitan area.