Earlier this week the New York Rangers lost to a very strong team, the Buffalo Sabres. One day later they played an opponent who would provide the Rangers with a more equal matchup. The Rangers ended up blowing the Toronto Maple Leafs off of the ice by beating them 5-1 on Wednesday.

This win was clutch for New York as it enhanced their chances to enter the playoffs. The Rangers now have 84 points, and find themselves in ninth place. They only trail eighth-place Boston by one point, and they are two behind Philadelphia who is in seventh-place.

The journey to the playoffs for the Rangers has been a rough one. Considering they had lost eight out of 12 games before going into the Olympic break, the chances of the blueshirts actually entering the postseason was very unlikely.

The Rangers only need to do one thing now to be a part of the postseason, and that is to defeat the Philadelphia Flyers in both games. The New York Rangers will be given their first opportunity at victory on Friday, April 9 when they suit up and hit the ice in Philadelphia.

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An announcement was made today by Glen Sather, President and General Manager of the New York Rangers, which said that Donald Brashear has joined a new team. Unfortunately for him, that new team is the Hartford Wolf Pack of the American Hockey League. He was sent to the Wolf Pack after he cleared waivers, and did not have any takers from the teams of the NHL.

With the Rangers this season, Brashear has played in 36 games, and has missed a total of 25. This number includes the last eight games in which he did not dress. In those 36 games he has had 73 penalty minutes, and ranks third on the team for the most penalty minutes. In the Rangers’ 5-2 win over Phoenix, he registered his first and only point with the Rangers as an assist.

In spite of that, he is still a veteran of the game. He suited up for his 1,000 career NHL game this season against Atlanta on November 12.

The New York Rangers won their last game vs Tampa 8-2 on January 19. The Rangers will play their next game on Valentine’s Day, Sunday, February 14 at 1pm against the Tampa Bay Lightning.

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Late Monday night a trade was made between the New York Rangers and the Calgary Flames. The deal was completed after the Philadelphia Flyers beat the Flames 3-0 where questions of whether Olli Jokinen would continue his time with Calgary.

The trade sent the Rangers’ left winger Christopher Higgins and right winger Ales Kotalik to the Flames in exchange for center Olli Jokinen and left winger Brandon Prust. Kotalik, Higgins, and Jokinen are all experiencing bad seasons, but this trade gives them opportunities for fresh starts. The Rangers are hoping that their new center, Olli Jokinen, will be a great asset to NHL star, Marian Gaborik.

Out of Christopher Higgins’ 55 games with the Rangers, he only had six goals and a mere eight assists. Although Higgins was previously a first round pick from Yale, this is the second time in less than a year he has been traded.

In July Ales Kotalik signed a $9 million deal with the Rangers that was was supposed to last for three years. What the Rangers got was not what they were expecting. Instead of a power-play specialist, and a top player they received a team member who started off great, scoring six times in his first 17 games, but only managed to score twice after. Shortly after, head coach John Tortella sent Kotalik to the benches.

The New York Rangers will play their next game in Los Angeles against the Kings on Tuesday, February 2, 2010.

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The New York Rangers were shut-out by the Philadelphia Flyers on Thursday night in Philadelphia. However, that was not the biggest news of the night. The fight that ensued between the Flyers Daniel Carcillo and New York’s Marian Gaborik became the hit story of the night.

It is no surprise that Daniel Carcillo would attack and begin a fight because he is one of hockey’s more well known enforcers. Last year he had 22 fights and was ranked 4th in the league for most fights. It is surprising however that he chose to fight Marian Gaborik, a Ranger superstar who has only been in one prior fight in his 551 game career.

Marian Gaborik is one of the NHL’s lead scorers. In 10 seasons he has had 248 goals, and he is one of the best players for the New York Rangers. This act of violence by Carcillo is “in hockey terms, a cowardly act.”

However, Carcillo claims to not have expected to fight who he did. It is unclear who dropped the gloves first, but the replay does show Carcillo grabbing Gaborik around his neck and punching him in the face with his gloves still on. The fight lasted for seven punches all by Carcillo as Gaborik landed none.

The New York Rangers will play their next game in Montreal against the Canadiens on Saturday, January 23.

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