The New York Rangers have acquired forward Tyler Motte from the Ottawa Senators for Julien Gauthier and a conditional seventh-round selection in the 2023 NHL Draft.
The New York Rangers general manager is not done tweaking his team for a playoff run. The Blueshirts made a deal with the Ottawa Senators dealing forward Julien Gauthier and a conditional seventh-round draft pick for forward Tyler Motte.
Should the Rangers make it past round one of the playoffs, the seventh-round pick becomes the lesser of the two 2023 sixth-round selections the Blueshirts own.
Motte, 27, returns for his second stint with the Rangers after playing nine regular seasons and 15 playoff games with the club during the 2021-22 campaign. He has played in 38 games for the Senators this season, scoring three goals with nine points.
The trade comes a day after head coach Gerard Gallant benched two of three forwards on the fourth line in last night’s overtime loss to the Calgary Flames. Gauthier and Jake Lesychyshyn did not see any ice time in the third period, essentially going with three lines on a night the team was playing the second game of back-to-backs in Western Canada.
Pere Capfriendly.com, the Rangers have $720,076 in free cap space and are projected to have $908,667 cap space at the trade deadline on Mar. 3.
The team is still looking for a strong fourth-line center but may not have the cap space to bring in another player.
In 307 NHL games split between the Senators, Rangers, Vancouver Canucks, Columbus Blue Jackets, and Chicago Blackhawks, Motte has tallied 38 goals and 33 assists for 71 points. In 2018-19 with Vancouver, Motte recorded career-highs in games played (74), goals (9), and points (16).
The Blackhawks initially selected Motte in the fourth round, 121st overall, of the 2013 NHL Entry Draft, and was traded to Columbus by Chicago in a deal that included Rangers forward Artemi Panarin.