Rangers won't have to face McDavid for Thursday's game against Oilers

EDMONTON, Alberta – Facing the Edmonton Oilers Thursday night without superstar Connor McDavid figured to make life a little bit easier for the Rangers. But no one in the visitor’s dressing room at Rogers Centre after the Blueshirts’ morning skate was jumping for joy because they weren’t going to have to defend the NHL’s best player.

“Obviously he's one of the best players in the world and it's unfortunate to see a player like that go down with an injury so early in the season,’’ defenseman K’Andre Miller said. “But obviously, that happens. In terms of how we view it, I don't think it changes much in our game. Obviously, he's a good player and [whether] he was out there or not, I think we're in the same mindset of shutting their top speed down. And they still have a good amount of firepower up front.’’

Even before McDavid got hurt – the team says it’s an upper-body injury – late in the Oilers’ overtime loss to Winnipeg on Sunday, Edmonton was off to a slow start. They entered Thursday’s game 1-4-1, coming off a 7-4 loss Tuesday in Minnesota in the first game McDavid missed.

But none of that mattered to Rangers coach Peter Laviolette, who was focused on his own team Thursday morning.

“We go about our business the same way,’’ Laviolette said. “Obviously, [McDavid's] an important player for them, so that is what it is. But for us it doesn't really change anything. We talk about offense, we talk about defense, prepare our power play, penalty kill. I think the changes that maybe come into play [with McDavid out] is that he's not in certain situations, and now somebody else is. And so we kind of coach around it that way. But you know, our business is our business.’’

Their way of doing business through the first six games was playing sound defense, getting solid goaltending from Igor Shesterkin and Jonathan Quick, winning faceoffs (at a clip of 53.1%) and having good special teams play. Their 2.17 goals-against per game was fifth-best in the league, and their 30% success rate on the power play was sixth-best.

And though they haven’t played the toughest of schedules, they had won three of their first four games on the road, with Thursday’s match against the Oilers, plus stops in Vancouver Saturday and Winnipeg Monday, remaining on the current five-game trip.

Where they haven’t stood out is in regular 5-on-5 play, where they had scored nine goals and allowed nine goals, entering Thursday. According to the analytics site Natural Stat Trick, they had generated 121 scoring chances for, while allowing 100 against, but they had produced 47 high-danger chances, and allowed 46.

“We're trying to push things, I think, offensively, with everybody… just continue to try and generate, in the time that we are in the offensive zone, to generate more,’’ Laviolette said.

Laviolette keeps coming back to the way the team played on opening night in Buffalo, when they dominated at both ends of the ice in a 5-1 win over the Sabres, and the performance in the opening game of the current trip, when they overwhelmed the Seattle Kraken in a 4-1 win. The 3-1 win at Calgary in the second game of the trip was a little bit too defensive, in the coach’s mind.

“Last game [in Calgary], we spent a little bit too much time in the defensive zone, a little too much time looking to block shots,’’ Laviolette said. “I'd like to flip that to the way we had it in Seattle, where we were pressing more.’’

With no McDavid to worry about Thursday, that figured to be easier to do.

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.