So Matt Rempe returned to the lineup for Monday’s Garden match against the Lightning after missing four games with an unidentified upper-body injury. The fourth-line winger replaced fourth-line winger Brett Berard because of course that’s how it works.
But the fact of the matter is that Chris Kreider could have come out as a healthy scratch without anyone particularly noticing the effects of No. 20’s absence on the ice and without anyone in the gallery second-guessing head coach Peter Laviolette’s decision.
The Rangers had six games left to play when taking the ice on Monday. This is the portion of the season where we should be counting up Kreider’s career accomplishments on his way to a franchise record 24th postseason series.
You didn’t know that, did you, that Kreider’s 23 postseason series wearing the Blueshirt tied him with Henrik Lundqvist as the standard-bearer for this woebegone franchise, or that his 13 series victories — five times going to the final four, in 2012, 2014, 2015, 2022 and 2024 — put him one ahead of the King in that category?
