![\"New](\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/new-york-rangers-head-coach-118807636.jpg\")
New York Rangers head coach Mike Sullivan coaches against the Seattle Kraken during the first period at Madison Square Garden. IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect<\/p>\nANAHEIM, Calif. \u2014 In his first comments since the Rangers retooling announcement, head coach Mike Sullivan assured that his team would continue to try to win every game.<\/p>\n
That means the veteran bench boss plans to coach and make decisions that he thinks will put the Blueshirts in the best position on a game-to-game basis. There doesn\u2019t appear to be any plan to hold players out of the lineup to protect against injury until a trade is imminent.<\/p>\n
Amid the club\u2019s current circumstances, however, the Rangers should be considering development and the long-term vision when making certain decisions going forward.<\/p>\n
Asked how much he has to weigh coaching to win and development, given how the last couple of days have gone, Sullivan said he didn\u2019t consider the two to be mutually exclusive.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy outlook on it is that it tends to go hand-in-hand,\u201d he said Sunday after practice at Honda Center. \u201cI think when you look at the nature of the league and how it\u2019s evolved, there was once a time when, really, development took place in the American League and the NHL was the NHL. I think with the salary cap and things of that nature, younger players are getting forced onto rosters, entry-level contracts, things like that to make the business side of it work. And as a result of that, development has to take place at the NHL level also. That\u2019s probably been the last 20 years and that\u2019s been my experience of being in the NHL.<\/p>\n
New York Rangers head coach Mike Sullivan coaches against the Seattle Kraken during the first period at Madison Square Garden. IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s an important element of what we do. I love that aspect of our job, but I also think it goes hand-in-hand with winning. I don\u2019t know that it\u2019s one at the expense of the other at our level. We\u2019ve put a lot of young guys in prominent roles this year out of necessity, with guys being injured and guys get an opportunity to play up the lineup and in special teams situations. A lot of times, that\u2019s how careers begin and develop, is with an opportunity with circumstances like this. Guys carve their way, they force their way onto a roster through their performance and their play. And that healthy competition is a positive thing for organizations. \u201cWe have a commitment to all of our players to help them continue to grow and develop, regardless of where they are in their career. Obviously, the young guys we pay particular attention to and we\u2019ll continue to do that.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Rangers have already had an influx of youth in the lineup this season, beginning with Noah Laba seizing the third-line center role out of training camp. Matthew Robertson also made the Opening Night roster, but the rookie defenseman has since taken root on the Rangers back end.<\/p>\n
Since then, Gabe Perreault, Brennan Othmann and Scott Morrow have essentially joined the fray full time. Brett Berard and Jaroslav Chmelar also got looks at different points this season as well.<\/p>\n
It is telling that Dylan Garand is still in Hartford amid goalie Igor Shesterkin\u2019s lower-body injury.<\/p>\n
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The Rangers evidently have more trust in Spencer Martin than their organizationally grown netminder, whom they drafted 103rd overall in 2020. Garand has yet to make his NHL debut, but he has served as backup before.<\/p>\n
Carson Soucy is expected to join the Rangers in California ahead of their matchup with the Ducks on Monday night.<\/p>\n
As a result, defenseman Connor Mackey was assigned back to Hartford.<\/p>\n
The 31-year-old Soucy did not play in Philadelphia due to personal reasons.<\/p>\n
The Rangers recalled forward Anton Blidh from Hartford.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ANAHEIM, Calif. \u2014 In his first comments since the Rangers retooling announcement, head coach Mike Sullivan assured that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":415484,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5111],"tags":[5,2310,3328,35,5190,5193,4,36,43],"class_list":{"0":"post-415483","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york-rangers","8":"tag-hockey","9":"tag-mike-sullivan-nhl","10":"tag-new-york","11":"tag-new-york-rangers","12":"tag-newyork","13":"tag-newyorkrangers","14":"tag-nhl","15":"tag-rangers","16":"tag-sports"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/115920148671440531","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/415483","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=415483"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/415483\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/415484"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=415483"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=415483"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=415483"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}