Three Areas The New York Rangers Must Address Before the Playoffs

Scoring Struggles in the Bottom Six.

The Rangers are having a tough time scoring in their bottom six, making it harder to reach the playoffs. Top guy Blake Wheeler only scored five goals this season.

Players like Barclay Goodrow, Nick Bonino, and Tyler Pitlick only got three goals combined. Jimmy Vesey and Will Cuylle did better with eight and seven goals, but more help is needed.

Injuries to Kaapo Kakko and Filip Chytil made things worse. Kakko brings more to the team, but the Rangers need to look for better scoring options in a trade to do well in the playoffs.

Even though Mika Zibanejad and Chris Kreider are doing well, they're not always consistent. The players put on their line haven't been good either. Kakko started the season there, but they didn't score enough. Wheeler, who replaced Kakko after he got hurt, has been even worse.

The Rangers need to find a player who's really good for that top line. They might look at players like Frank Vatrano (Anaheim Ducks) or Vladimir Tarasenko (Ottawa Senators) who played well with Zibanejad and Kreider before. Elias Lindholm (Calgary Flames) can also work because he can play center or right wing.

The Rangers used to be good at defending until December. They were good at stopping teams in the middle and dealing with the other team's attacks.

But now, they don't seem to know how to defend. They stopped using the 1-3-1 system that worked for them.

Now, they let the other team into their zone too easily and have a hard time with the other team's attacks.

If the Rangers want to stay on top of their division, they need to go back to playing better defense.

Even though they got a lot of points early in the season, they need to fix these problems soon if they want to be good for the rest of the season.

As seen on Thehockeywriters