Coach Peter Laviolette rarely calls out individual players publicly, but the ice time he distributes can speak for him.
Captain Jacob Trouba was on the ice for only 13:37 in the New York Rangers’ win Saturday against the Montreal Canadiens. In 363 games with New York, he’s played less than 13:37 only seven times. He either got injured or was ejected in four of those games, and two instances were before the 2021-22 season. The other was on Dec. 3, 2022, when he had two fighting penalties and a hooking minor for 12 total penalty minutes. That’s also the game he threw his helmet at the Rangers’ bench and yelled at his teammates to wake up.
Part of Trouba’s reduced minutes was because he spent five minutes in the penalty box after fighting Montreal’s Josh Anderson, earning praise from both Laviolette and his teammates. Still, he’s had fights in the past, including earlier this year in Montreal, and has not seen such a drastic reduction in minutes.
Trouba has also never come close to playing as little as he did against Montreal in a playoff game, be it with the Rangers or with the Winnipeg Jets, where he spent the first six years of his career. He’s played more than 16 minutes in all 73 of his career postseason contests and has averaged 22:17.
With the Rangers trying to break out of a five-game skid, Laviolette showed a willingness to shake up players’ ice time. K’Andre Miller, for example, played 17:23, compared to his 21:37 season average. But Trouba’s dip was the most drastic. Zac Jones, who played the second-fewest minutes of any New York defenseman on Sunday, logged 16:50 — more than three minutes more than Trouba, who was coming off two games in which he’s played more than 20 minutes.
Per colleague Dom Luszczyszyn’s model, which accounts for both offensive and defensive metrics, Trouba has a minus-3.3 net rating, which is the worst among Rangers defensemen. Known for his physicality, his hits are down, too. He’s averaging 4.53 hits per 60 minutes this season, by far his lowest total with the Rangers and worse than his 7.86 rate last season. It’s been a difficult start to the year for the 30-year-old Trouba, perhaps not aided by his name being in trade talks both over the summer and during the Rangers’ recent losing streak.
Though he’s struggled at five-on-five, Trouba has remained a key part of the Rangers’ penalty kill, which ranks second in the league. Even with his five-on-five ice time cut against Montreal, he played 3:37 on the kill, second only to Ryan Lindgren among Rangers’ defensemen.
Trouba has played significant minutes his entire career. Entering 2023-24, his lowest per-game ice time average was 21:12 in 2022-23. This year he’s at 20:09. If Saturday was any indication, that could continue to drop.
Trouba’s ice time leads off our weekly observations column, which covers losses against the St. Louis Blues, Carolina Hurricanes and Philadelphia Flyers, plus the much-needed win against the Canadiens. I have nine this week in honor of Will Cuylle’s goal total.
1. Full rosters for the 4 Nations Face-Off come out Wednesday. Each competing country already named six players to its roster. Two Rangers were announced in that group: Adam Fox for the U.S. and Mika Zibanejad for Sweden.
Several others could make their national teams this week. Kaapo Kakko will likely get to represent Finland, especially after his solid start to the NHL season. He has 13 points in 23 games and is tied for the Rangers’ lead in plus-minus. Among the team’s Canadians, Alexis Lafrenière is most likely to play in the tournament, though he’s on the bubble. He’d likely be in the bottom six if he were to make the team, and Canada could go with better two-way players in those roles.
The same reasons that could keep Lafrenière off his national team are the reasons I predict Chris Kreider and Vincent Trocheck will make the American roster. General manager Bill Guerin could pick them over higher-scoring players because of their ability to play in different situations. Though they have skills of their own, both are capable of killing penalties and playing on the American fourth line.
2. Matt Rempe got another call-up, this time for a game against the Blues, but it did not go well. In his 9:24 of five-on-five ice time, the Rangers were outshot 5-2 and outchanced 5-1, per Natural Stat Trick. He also took a foolish roughing penalty with the Rangers down a goal early in the third period, running into Jake Neighbors well away from the puck. The Rangers sent him back to AHL Hartford after the game. He has two goals, an assist and a minus-seven rating in 12 games with the Wolf Pack.
3. The Blues game was a disaster for the Rangers, but it came with a couple of funny visuals. At one point Igor Shesterkin lost his stick with St. Louis in the New York zone, and Artemi Panarin gave the goalie his. The Rangers weren’t able to get the puck out of danger for a bit, so Shesterkin ended up in his crease with a non-goalie stick for a while. Cuylle also went flying toward the net after scoring a second-period goal. He grabbed onto the crossbar and found himself on top of the net for a second.
4. Though a little goofy-looking at the end, the Cuylle goal was an example of how he’s been so effective for New York. He won a puck battle to start the play, then beat his man to the net and finished a Zibanejad feed.
Cuylle has 20 points on the year, tied for second among all Rangers, and has continued producing during this recent rough stretch. He has six points in his past six games. Per Luszczyszyn’s model, he has a plus-2.1 net rating, which ranks second on the Rangers to only Adam Fox. The Rangers have needed everything he’s given, and it will likely earn him a pretty penny in restricted free agency this coming summer.
5. Rangers general manager Chris Drury surely wants Jack Drury, his nephew, on the Hurricanes, to do well most of the time, but Wednesday was almost certainly an exception. The Rangers were in Carolina, and Jack Drury scored a goal and assisted Jackson Blake’s game winner to hand New York its fourth loss in a row. Former Rangers forward Jack Roslovic also picked up an assist on the game winner. He’s up to 12 goals and 15 points on the year.
6. During the five-game losing streak, the Rangers got outshot 84-42 in the first period.
“We’ve got to play with some speed and some attitude,” Laviolette said ahead of the Montreal game. “We got outdone in both of those areas (in Philadelphia), which is unacceptable for a team that sits where we sit. What we’re in right now, the start needs to be better.”
The Rangers responded with a solid first period against Montreal, outshooting the Canadiens 10-7 and taking a 2-1 lead to intermission.
7. When on the same line, Zibanejad and Kreider almost always go first during pregame line rushes. They switched it up against Montreal, perhaps searching for some different mojo entering the game. They went third.
8. Playing in his fourth NHL game, Brett Berard took a big hit from Kirby Dach against Montreal. He went to the dressing room for a bit but returned to the game. He had tape on his shoulder afterward.
9. Ahead of Friday’s game, Flyers president of hockey operations Keith Jones delivered to retiring Rangers broadcaster Sam Rosen an engraved brick from the Spectrum, the Flyers’ arena from 1968-1996.
“On behalf of the Philadelphia Flyers, congratulations on 40 years of an exceptional broadcast career in the NHL,” it read.
Nice gesture.
(Top photo of Jacob Trouba fighting Josh Anderson: John Jones / Imagn Images)
