Rangers’ Igor Shesterkin, Pavel Buchnevich arrive in New York

New York Rangers G Igor Shesterkin and forward Pavel Buchnevich arrived in New York last weekend and should be on the ice later this week.

New York Post’s Mollie Walker reported on Tuesday that the Rangers rookie goaltender returned from Florida as that state is dealing with a spike in COVID-19 cases. The Florida Department of Health revealed that the number of known coronavirus cases in the state rose by 3,289 since Monday morning. There were 64 more COVID-19 deaths in Florida since Monday’s update, bringing the total number for the state to at least 3,237.

Shesterkin had been practicing with Washington Capitals’ Alex Ovechkin, Colorado Avalanche defenseman Nikita Zadorov, Florida Panthers winger Evgenii Dadonov, and retired Rangers defenseman Darius Kasparaitis.

Shesterkin and Buchnevich will have to wait to hit the ice at the Rangers training facility in Tarrytown, NY until they are cleared to play after getting tested for COVID-19 under the NHL’s Return-to-Play protocol.

Newsday’s Colin Stephenson twitted on Monday that Alexandar Georgiev and Kaapo Kakko should be arriving from Finland on Friday. They both will have to be tested and cleared before they can partake in the voluntary workouts.

They will join Artemi Panarin, Chris Kreider, Brendan Smith, Brendan Lemieux, Marc Staal, Adam Fox, and Philip Di Giuseppe who have been practicing in small groups since Phase 2 of the NHL’s RTP protocol began on June. 8

Training Camp Rosters

It is believed that when training camp begins on July 10 Vitali Kravtsov will get an opportunity to make the squad. Team President John Davidson stated that Vitali Kravtsov will attend camp and certainly has a shot to make the team for the Qualifying Rounds scheduled to begin on July 30.

“I think with Kravtsov, he’s going to come to our camp and we’ll see how it goes. We’re going to need some depth and skill as we march along here,” Davidson said in a video via the team’s official Twitter account on Tuesday.

One player who will not attend training camp is Lias Andersson. Following a tough season that saw him play on opening night for the Blueshirts, along with a trip over a wire on the ice when he was announced to the sellout crowd at MSG, the former first-round pick saw his ice time decreased and eventually was demoted to the AHL. He then walked away from the Hartford Wolf Pack and after receiving permission from the organization played in Sweden for HV71.

Andersson requested that he stay in Sweden instead of competing for a spot on the team in training camp. The Rangers granted his request to stay overseas, but his future with the team is unclear currently.