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00:01we have a special episode of up in the blue seats this week if you're watching on video right now
00:08you can see brian and i are actually together in the same city so we thought let's share a screen
00:14for once um but apologies for the scheduling conflicts last week uh just to quickly recap
00:22where the rangers have been and what they've been doing real quick they had a five-day break
00:27at one point then they lost four to one to edmonton on home they beat the st louis blues 3
00:34-1
00:34snapped a four-game losing streak in the process they beat philadelphia 3-2 and they beat seattle
00:43in seattle 4-3 to kick off this four-game road trip out west they are 8-2-0 at
00:52home picked up their
00:53second win on the road in seattle pretty good couple of weeks for the rangers and we were pretty
00:59down on them just last time we were recording so where are you at now uh i'm kind of back
01:06where
01:06we were at i think in the preseason i think this is sort of the ups and downs that you're
01:12going to see
01:14with sort of what this roster is in the beginning part of the season now we thought that prior to
01:22understand or seeing igor get hurt so i think they are they're playing well i think we're gonna have
01:29to say that they're playing for what they are they are playing well there is obviously there was a bit
01:36of an issue on the road and they got a i thought a really nice win against seattle now let's
01:41take it
01:42back to you know st louis looks great they should beat that st louis team similar records similar sort
01:47of i think i think they're kind of in a similar spot in terms of where they are as a
01:52franchise
01:53you have to beat philly and they came from behind to do that so that's a great that's a great
01:59sign with
01:59a big goal from your big free agent and then you know just taking care of business i love the
02:06start
02:07i love two periods and being able to see corpus all come in and play really well i thought that
02:13those were i mean you look at the positives are they a perfect club right now no i don't think
02:17i
02:17don't think anyone is i think carolina is probably closest to it but this is the race to be in
02:23the top
02:23three in the metro first comeback win in philly in the season too i mean yeah that's the team you
02:29want to beat and i say at home against st louis you have to win that game and then you
02:33have to
02:33beat the teams below you especially in your division so yeah there were parts of that
02:40game in philly they probably don't love but not a lot i think it was a pretty good game i
02:44think the
02:45game in st louis was pretty convincing or at home against st louis was pretty convincing and then
02:50you know the seattle game is is what it is you have to go on the road against a team
02:54that plays
02:54pretty gritty you know they have a lack of superstardom but they come at you in waves so
03:01i mean so far so good big test uh the next game or upcoming game against edmonton that's a different
03:07animal but you win or you learn and let's not forget how decimated this rangers team has been with
03:15injuries and more just continue to pile up the rangers just placed sean derzy on ir after he had been
03:23battling something the last couple of weeks missed few practices for some maintenance days and now
03:30he's officially sidelined with a lower body injury but he was skating today at the optional morning
03:35skate in a red non-contact jersey so his injury is retroactive to october 26 so he can be activated
03:43and put back in the lineup at any time i don't think it should be too much longer um you
03:49know scott
03:49morrow has gotten a nice look here because of that what have you seen from number 60 and and do
03:55the rangers have the depth on the back end to make it through this it looks like it um you
04:02know it's
04:02interesting and we can get into robertson too but with morrow i do you know his his agility i think
04:10his
04:10edges are pretty good and i think he's added some speed to his game i think last year he got
04:15surprised
04:16uh on like breakouts and they weren't good last year getting the puck out of their own end and
04:20it's not on him the whole i mean the whole yeah the team had some trouble with it i think
04:24minus the
04:25top pair so he looked like he looks like he has improved in that he looks way more comfortable
04:31under pressure and you know without pressure and he's jumping into plays so that's a confidence thing
04:37if he has that confidence he can make the simple plays he's that'll grow he'll continue to try to
04:44jump up and i think if he continues to get minutes and confidence he can be a part of the
04:51offense a
04:51little bit more which if you have a guy in sheltered minutes number one you want to be able to
04:57defend
04:57you want to be able to exit the zone but if you can get some bonus offense out of it
05:02it just adds so
05:03much depth to your backing and i think improving his skating was something that he really wanted to
05:08work on in the offseason and i feel like i have definitely noticed that yeah yeah it's evident
05:13it's definitely evident yeah now albert smitz is now week to week with an upper body injury he was
05:19a very last minute scratch in seattle he took warm-ups and matthew robertson was telling us
05:26today i don't know if you heard this at locker room but he was talking about how you know he
05:30basically
05:31had to take it off all of his gear and they were like oh nope you're going in and he
05:34was like oh god
05:35he said he went up there and skated a really hard couple laps and and then he was thrown in
05:41there
05:41uh but yeah it gives matthew robertson a chance to finally play in front of his home crowd in
05:47edmonton remember he was scratched last time when he came back here after playing in a series of games
05:54so that was that was a that was pretty unfortunate for him but he said he was super excited and
05:59has up
06:00to 15 friends and family members come tonight so very excited for matthew robertson um other notes
06:07and transactions james reimer very very brief era for the new york rangers was placed on waivers for
06:15the purpose of contract termination with the return of unis corpus allo as you mentioned how did how
06:21did corpus allo look to you um 25 saves in that game so i thought he was awesome and there
06:28was not a ton
06:29of action in the first 40 minutes but there was some you know it was some difficult moments for him
06:35because there were deflections there were rebounds late in the second period you saw a complete
06:39breakdown with i think three seconds left where i believe was vince dunn on the doorstep it was just
06:48it was a breakdown and he had to come across and look very confident looked very big had control of
06:54his his rebounds made a few you know great stick saves that i think are positional saves so he has
07:02his net he knows where he's at sometimes with not a lot of reps that could be the problem and
07:06he was
07:07he was perfect with that got whistles when he had to especially in the third period because
07:12the momentum that was mounting in seattle's favor and he hung in there it's he made the next save
07:17yeah he had two really great periods as did the rangers he didn't have a ton of work he had
07:22a ton of
07:23work in the third and you look at it like you know three goals on was it 28 shots
07:29he was better than what that stat line says and i definitely think rust was expected so the fact
07:37that it wasn't so much of a factor early on um was definitely an encouraging sign and i do feel
07:43like
07:44now that corpus allo is back the rangers you know you have to see how he settles in and what
07:50the
07:50goaltending situation and tandem really looks like before making an executive decision on what to do
07:56there moving forward um they have been banking on him stabilizing it um but how he performs obviously
08:03will likely answer the question for the rangers moving forward yeah and i don't i think they're in
08:10an okay place right now uh i think now you don't have to do anything if you can do a
08:16tandem a real
08:17tandem i think rob i'm guessing i don't have any information on this but probably that's the ideal
08:24scenario because you have a young goaltender that could be a part of this going forward giving him
08:32games where he stays in it and not long layoffs so you can almost play every other a couple here
08:37a
08:38couple there i think that's i think big picture that makes sense um with the i think luxury of if
08:45like
08:45one of their games slips they can take a week or 10 days get back with the goaltending coach trying
08:53to
08:53get your game back that way and you have a viable option so it could go any number of directions
08:58i
08:58guess it can go two directions with either guy but um i don't think adding or bring someone in and
09:06losing another asset for that trade piece would is necessary now so they they held the fort
09:11dylan grand held the fort yeah 12 straight games yeah um it's their they've weathered that storm yeah
09:17no i agree um it should at least give them you know some stability and and a normal a sense
09:26of
09:26normalcy with the goaltending schedule which i feel like they have severely been missing uh and last but
09:32not least uh my umass guy defenseman mark del guiso was recalled on sunday for the extra body on d
09:40just named captain of the wolf pack just won less than a month almost into his first year with a
09:47with
09:48a new team so says a lot about us umass folk i think oh totally totally you know when i
09:53came in
09:54to the american league when you got named captain it was like a death sentence to your nhl really yeah
09:59yeah they uh the older guys that would get to see were just like it's over my my dream is
10:06not the case
10:07anymore we've seen captains come up all the time so leadership is leadership you want the guy that's
10:14going to be there obviously if you can find one but they are a younger group i think they have
10:18some
10:19veterans but they're going to be some guys going up and down yep he is clearly one of them johnny
10:24brudzinski with like a word um moving on to some hot topics from the last couple weeks something new
10:34the rangers have tried the last three games not so sure it will be the case tonight in edmonton though
10:40but will cooley at third line center what do you make of that move brian and how do you see
10:46it when
10:47a player makes a positional change like that i think bolino going down is why different things have to
10:55happen and it is not a straight line in development for any player and noah laba offensively has
11:02not produced so taking a little bit off of his plate to simplify and ask him to do
11:08very specific things to help the team win might be part of that will cooley is a good skater he
11:16is
11:17aware and conscientious defensively he plays a hard brand and has been taking face-offs
11:22you know for i think off and on for a couple years especially on his on the left side now
11:28defensive
11:29zone draws on the right side on a penalty kill or whatnot it's a totally different animal
11:34and i don't think he's in that position very often um because you have control over who's going out
11:39taking that draw but it's so much more to the position having said that the game has evolved so
11:45much where it's it's not center left wing right wing as much it still is to an extent but it's
11:52not as
11:53much it's more f1 f2 f3 offensively and defensively so if you're f3 in the offensive zone you're f1 on
11:59the
11:59way back right that's your low forward and in meetings with coaches in the past watching tape
12:06watching video it's our low forward is here we want him here or this is our low forward doing a
12:12good job that could be any one of the three forwards usually it's the center and you want it to
12:17be the
12:18center for that coach but everyone needs to understand we're seeing more teams do man-on-man
12:23defense it's it's a five-man concept it's a five-man unit we've heard mike sullivan talk about
12:28fives playing in fives being around in fives that's part of it so i don't know the adjustment is
12:35that difficult um i'm a center who could easily go to wing and i played some d
12:41i'm biased i think centers you have to be able to think a little bit more but you're in the
12:45middle
12:45of the storm so regardless how well you can skate it's your brain it's your anticipation it's where
12:51your stick goes that might take a few reps i think he's fine i don't think it's long term
12:56but it could be as he continues to progress depending on what they have the center depth which is
13:03it's thin right now yeah i didn't i didn't hate it just under the circumstances and i thought that of
13:09all the players on that team to make that ask of will cooley is probably the most perfect guy just
13:16in terms of i mean you could see it in that first game that he was skating in the middle
13:20how hard
13:21he was working to make it work you know how much effort he was putting into the role physically it
13:27is
13:28the hardest position yeah and again i played all of them so regardless of what anyone thinks you mean
13:33that's why defense can play 24 25 sometimes 28 a center playing 21 minutes is still harder you're
13:40burning way more calories so it's it's just you got to play 200 feet it's the whole ring i think
13:46what i
13:46liked the most about the move is that it allowed noelaba to drop down to the fourth line center luke
13:54glendennin came out and melash comes in matt rempey comes in and i thought that that fourth line
14:00was just considerably faster the last few games just making way more of an impact with their
14:09limited ice time than i felt like the rangers were getting before melash was on that line it was
14:15returned to that line that's just my personal observation they're asked to get it out of their
14:20end get it in the other end and leave it there if you can for the top lines to go
14:23in and if you can
14:25play with it and and have zone time that's a bonus thought they played fast they played physical
14:32they were they did absolutely what you would picture that's what you would draw up that's this
14:37is what you need to do to help us tonight and they did that it does look like luke glendennin
14:42will be
14:42back in the lineup tonight against edmonton but don't quote me on that until you see it on the ice
14:48because you never know with these things but another great story from the last couple weeks
14:55ty cartier absolutely fantastic three goals and five points in his last five games he makes his
15:04return to seattle for the first time the very team that gave up on him and waived him last year
15:10to the rangers benefit um what do you like the most about cartier's game brian and how much
15:17of steel has he been oh well he is he has been a steel jason botrell we we connected in
15:25in seattle
15:26he's uh managing seattle now and he just knew he told sully because they have a relationship from
15:30pittsburgh you're gonna love this kid and you know he just couldn't find a place for him he knew
15:35he was giving up a quality human being and a quality player and now you know again we say it
15:41all the
15:41time and luck is when opportunity or when preparation meets opportunity and he's obviously prepared he
15:48obviously works extremely hard in his craft he's developed so you'll see the doggedness and just
15:57the relentless you know like he looks like the old 24 that i played with really honest to god it's
16:02the guy will not be stopped and they'll put himself on the line just to help the team he plays
16:08in
16:08straight lines he plays physical but he has voice and you know there's there's been plays in the
16:16philly game where he's back checked and gotten fucking high ice of zone end and made a poised
16:20play that's created another chance uh his goal against billy the game winner he he's the one in
16:26the corner getting the puck out of the zone in the d zone and in seven seconds he has the
16:30puck on
16:31stick and it's in the net because he sees the play bump back he finds ice he notices it's adam
16:35fox
16:36so he gets open with speed it's on his tape he flies in and scores like his iq
16:42is higher than he's got credit for because of his work ethic and that's you know he's a second
16:49line player now mike's all just put him on a power play because he's leading the team in five on
16:53five
16:53points it's like am i crazy do i have to am i overthinking this why don't i put him on
16:58yeah that
16:58was great that was that was an answer to my question and yeah i just i loved i love the
17:04way that
17:04sullivan was like am i crazy for thinking this like just like bouncing it off the coaching staff
17:09like i'm not insane for thinking that we should put ty cartier on the second power play you know right
17:14but i mean if i feel like especially sullivan the whole organization has preached you know getting
17:20the results and and getting rewarded for it and i feel like ty cartier is just such a perfect example
17:26and even sullivan said it himself like what a great story he's been this season and yeah he's
17:31he he's earned that second power play and and those uh man advantage minutes for sure and and
17:37he's been a pleasure to watch and of course in seattle you ask him you have any extra motivation
17:43coming into this game the team that gave up on you nope not at all i'm a member of the
17:48new york
17:49rangers i want to play well for the new york rangers we were like sullivan was like yeah he's i
17:53don't buy
17:54it so it was like he's he's a nice kid but i'm sure there was some added motivation in there
18:00and
18:00and he was he was a big part of that seattle game for sure um another guy who is starting
18:08to
18:08heat up pavel dorofiev has his first big moment in a rangers jersey the game tying power play goal
18:16in the third period against the flyers but what comes to mind about that game was mike sullivan
18:23talking about how he's consulted former rangers head coach john tortorella who had dorofiev in
18:30vegas at the end of last season just consulting with him on on how to get pavel going and and
18:37what he should be doing to try and put him in a better i mean what did you make of
18:42of hearing that
18:43i was a little surprised with how forthcoming mike sullivan was about that you know for a guy who's not
18:49in the coaching in the league right now too well so big moment right tying the game up on a
18:56beautiful shot that's what you know we know the league know everyone knows that is what dorofiev
19:02can do and that's what he does so well he can beat goalies from distance with that shot when you
19:10if you want it as a coach you want to get the most out of every player and you don't
19:17want any player to
19:18think this is what i am and i can't improve there's so many great stories of players having
19:25long great careers who always want to improve like a sydney crosby's that type of player and
19:30you know you have so many more examples marty saint louis who was still trying to get better when he
19:35was in new york his last two years these guys just constantly want to improve so i think everybody
19:42wants that for dorofiev and i'm not saying he doesn't but there's ways mike sullivan is trying to get
19:47through to him saying you you can be better in these areas that will give you more chances to
19:53have the puck in scoring areas and you know there's a battle that there's a battle level that is expected
20:00and he plays bit perimeter he wants to find quiet ice get the shot score and that is what he
20:06has needed
20:07to do that's why they got him but you still have to pull on the rope that everybody else is
20:12pulling on
20:12and i think that's what they're trying to get out of it and we remember in that game i think
20:16he played
20:17in the first six minutes of the third period he wasn't having a particularly strong game he was
20:21losing some battles he was reaching a bit and i think they just i mean you want to see a
20:26player
20:26in a battle where it's a 50 50 kind of get over that puck and protect it you don't even
20:31need to
20:31necessarily skate away with it you just can't let the other team skate away with it and that happened
20:36a few times in the philly game and he got his opportunity again because you have to do that with
20:41star
20:41players and any i think it was an emotional thing for him because it was he understands he was fighting
20:49it of course and those things can happen with confidence you can you're if you have confidence
20:53it's crazy but you skate faster you are stronger it's there's no doubt and there's no wasted energy
21:00stressing he was better in seattle scored what turned out to be the game winning goal on a beautiful
21:06finish and so that is momentum he is the stats look great but his game is coming as well which
21:15is like
21:15that for a streaky guy that's where you can end sort of a streakiness that if you bring that every
21:22night you're going to get chances every night and sullivan touched on it in that post game press
21:27conference about you know the adjustment that is probably coming with moving from a team like
21:34vegas with talent like jack eichel and mitch marner those the yeah those guys being the ones feeding him
21:42the puck it's a different team it's a differently built team it operates much differently and for a guy
21:50with his skill set i'm sure that was an adjustment and i agree i think it's also about like also
21:55pulling in
21:56the same direction as the as the rest of the team is at the same time it's an area that
22:01needs to improve
22:04but starting to to heat up a little bit and starting to find a bit of a groove which is
22:09always a good
22:10thing for the rangers and hopefully can carry over into a game against the edmonton oilers tonight
22:17um but going back to the seattle game uh they obviously almost blew a four nothing lead you
22:24kind of touched on that third period a little bit but they gave up three unanswered in the final 20
22:29minutes and were holding on for dear life yeah part of part of me felt like it truly felt like
22:34the jet
22:35lag had just hit them at the third period um because they really played such a strong 40 minutes of
22:42that
22:42game and it felt like they had a big enough lead but momentum swings and yeah it's completely swung
22:49against them yeah and you shouldn't have too much going from east to west to be honest with you and
22:57the game certainly turned and it turned you know done scores that goal at the end of the second
23:02that we talked about corpus all makes a big save who knows right but it could have benefited them it
23:08could have snapped them out of it with 20 minutes break but it's a four nothing game there were a
23:13few
23:15times i thought they left seattle off they let seattle off the hook with lateral plays in the middle of
23:22the offensive zone that were not 100 plays listen you have a four nothing lead and it's a younger team
23:28so they're going to have to learn this a four nothing game unless you are 200 sure you just roll
23:37it back
23:37down the wall if you make a team defend and win a battle and then have to come 200 feet
23:42the clock is
23:44your best friend so it does nothing matters other than make them come the whole way and the rangers
23:50got a little loose with that some guys trying to make plays you don't need five nothing or six nothing
23:56you just need the zero and when the one goes in and then it's power play they get on the
24:01board again
24:02and it's a great give and go and veneers finds eberle on the back side they had adjusted their
24:07power play seattle did which i thought was a nice adjustment they wanted to play in the high ice the
24:12rangers took that away so they played low and made a great play now it's four two
24:18that's a way different mental scenario and so now you're forced to use less of your bench
24:24sullivan's mixing and matching guys are thinking about exactly who's up next and the rhythm of the game
24:29is different that's how momentum happens and then everyone in seattle woke up because it was a very
24:35quiet building for 40 days yes oh completely i mean when i think don had the the goal that made
24:42it a
24:42one goal game the building went absolutely insane and i was somewhat preparing for it to be heading to
24:49to overtime but no they absolutely pulled that one out and i'd wrote that written this yesterday just
24:55about how i feel like they do need to improve the way that they manage those momentum swings because
25:01i even go back to the first time they played the oilers connor mcdavid flying down scoring 50 seconds
25:09into the game immediate momentum swing and edmondson's favor and it there was no answer for it
25:17he he's different of course that's one thing is it's against the against the upper echelon teams in the
25:24league who have guys like that yeah it could be a caprice up it could be matthews you know whoever
25:29it is because there are more teams that have that than the rangers that are going to come in and
25:35single-handedly swing the momentum in their favor and i feel like the rangers do need to
25:40find a better way to manage it and to have find an answer for it than they've shown this season
25:46puck placement is so huge and obviously you need to win the battles and you don't want to be on
25:52your
25:52hale's giving team space so if you have puck placement that's mike solid says it all the time
25:57dictate the terms if if i know my winger's putting it soft into the strong corner i'm i don't have
26:03to
26:04think i'm going straight to that corner for an altercation there's going to be a physical i want
26:08that puck to stop there i don't want if i can get there fast enough if i can't i'm still
26:12going to bump
26:12the guy but i have to get back into play to support if it goes to the weak side f3
26:17is coming down
26:17the guy that dumped it is now f3 and i'm going to help him in the corner and those are
26:21that all
26:21starts because i know my winger is putting it there when you want to make lateral plays you're
26:26not quite sure and then oh now he dumped it in all right well now i'm stickling late and that
26:32defenseman can he doesn't have to keep it on the wall he can put it on the other defenseman's tape
26:36now we're back yeah so puck placement's so huge yeah no it's i think it's it's did my did my
26:45hands
26:45yeah paint the picture i think so they're big enough for sure
26:51uh all right we got three more games left on this road trip which city are you looking forward to
26:57going
26:57to most i mean i'm gonna i'm here in edmonton and then we go to calgary but then i'm leaving
27:04oh
27:04you're not going so i would say on this road trip palm beach is my excited destination we're going
27:10how nice hockey tournament must be nice must be nice now i'm actually excited for vancouver vancouver
27:16is really fun we're gonna go out for some steak in calgary yeah getting a nice steak in with the
27:22media that's a dumb media we don't know any um but yeah i mean it's kind of funny how this
27:29uh
27:31this western swing has changed over the years like i feel like the rangers should win at least
27:37two of the next three games so that is why winning in seattle was so big if you win a
27:43couple at home
27:44and then you leave and you can get more points than games big at five six seven points that's a
27:52great
27:52road trip and you're putting yourself in a spot where you know carolina's carolina the devils are
27:59i think a legitimate playoff team if you can try to get to the two spot as close as you
28:05can yeah
28:06that's great because you i think washington is coming but then i think that's kind of
28:12it's a three-team race for two spots the atlantic is
28:18first and second in the wild card and third fourth fifth and sixth so or third fourth and fifth yeah
28:23um
28:24the top five wild card teams are all the atlantic division right now as i looked at it two days
28:28ago
28:28it might be might have changed by one but it is a gauntlet so you're going to get you're going
28:35to get three teams in the metro you got to get a hundred percent so these are big games every
28:41single one of them but i think i i mean obviously the oilers are playing pretty ridiculous right now but
28:48they uh you know you want to see the rangers start to pick up some wins against the top 10
28:54in the
28:55nhl because they haven't played all of them but the only team that i wrote i wrote this i don't
29:00think it's changed but the only team in the top 10 they have wins against is tampa twice twice and
29:07tampa's a jet and it was a two convincing wins too so that's not it's nothing to sneeze at but
29:13it's you know you have to choose um it's over it already happened so we have to look forward right
29:18listen edmonton this game is this is the best team they'll play they have done what they've done
29:25without two or three forwards that they count on in their lineup they've missed matias ekholm at times
29:31it is a healthy edmonton team surging and devin levi looks like he's playing pretty confident so the
29:41holes that edmonton cup finalist edmonton have had in the past this team is a much better team
29:50than those teams and it's not because connor's on a record-setting pace it's not because leon looks
29:55like he's going to get 160 points and lose to connor by 50 it's crazy that's crazy but now zach
30:02hyman's back and jason dickinson is back and kapanen looks like he has a good role and they're
30:06getting pod coles and this guy who is a unicorn because he'll fight anyone and he's a top six
30:13player but he's playing on the bottom so they have they have depth they're being used correctly and
30:19they have i don't care what everyone say about a brilliant head coach yeah that should be it should
30:25be a good one so we'll see how that goes and i think that puts a bow on our first
30:31episode in the
30:32same screen together live give us a thumbs up like subscribe tell us if you like this format
30:39better uh we'll try to take it into consideration when we can um yeah it's pretty hard but we do
30:47our
30:47best we do our best um let us know what you think of how ty cartier is doing let us
30:52know if you think
30:53junis corpus allo is going to be the savior in net and how the rangers should do on this upcoming
30:58road
30:59trip and we'll chat again next week
31:05you