Jack Roslovic’s dropoff means Rangers’ shuffling still unfinished
NY Post
Given the opportunity by a generous journalist to frame Sunday’s healthy scratch for Jack Roslovic 15 games into his Rangers career as, “Just a rotation thing?” head coach Peter Laviolette seized the moment by affirming it as, “just a rotation thing.”
Which represents a funny way to say, “a benching.”
It is not Laviolette’s way to call out players in public. There may not have been a single time this first season behind the New York bench when the coach has pointed a finger — or directed a pointed message — at one of his players.
He sure wasn’t about to start with Roslovic, who went from a stabilizing influence on the right with Chris Kreider and Mika Zibanejad to a perceived liability and had taken a seat through large swatches of Friday’s 4-3 victory in Detroit before watching this 5-2 Garden victory over the Habs in street clothes.
Laviolette has talked about how having 13 healthy forwards on the roster has tasked him with making a personnel call every game. The coach has said that matchups might be a part of the equation in attempting to define the club’s most formidable lineup entering the first game of the first round of the playoffs.
But that was generally inferred as, ultimately, the decision distilled to whether to dress Matt Rempe or to go with Jonny Brodzinski as the 12th forward. Only the most literal-minded deduced Laviolette truly thought that 22-year-old Will Cuylle needed a rest a month before the playoffs when he came out of the lineup as a healthy scratch against the Panthers on March 23.
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