The Rangers head into Sunday night with a familiar kind of early-season profile: they’ve been hard to score on at home, dangerous when they get rolling, and backed by a blue line that keeps piling up production. Edmonton comes to Madison Square Garden for the first of two meetings in a nine-day stretch, with puck drop set for 6:00 PM ET on MSG Network and ESPN 880 AM.
New York opens a 13-game November schedule that breaks down to seven home games and six on the road, and the next three are all at The Garden. The Blueshirts will also be in their thirds jersey for the second time in four chances this season.
At home, the Rangers have been one of the league’s sharpest teams. They’re tied for the NHL lead with six wins and tied for second with 12 points on home ice.
Their 32 goals at home are tied for third in the league, while their 16 goals allowed are tied for the seventh-fewest. Even more telling, New York has scored at least three goals in every one of its seven home games this season, the longest active streak in the NHL.
They’ve also hit the four-goal mark eight times overall, tied for fifth in the league.
The defensive numbers back up the results. The Rangers’ 2.29 goals against per game at home is tied for fifth in the NHL, and they’ve allowed two or fewer goals in a game eight times this season, tied for fifth in the league.
They’re also tied for seventh with four games in which they’ve given up one or fewer. On special teams, New York has gone 38-for-42 on the penalty kill, good for third in the NHL at 90.5 percent.
The physical side has been there too. The Rangers rank sixth in the league with 364 hits, and Will Cuylle is seventh in the NHL with 59 hits. Since the 2023-24 season, Cuylle ranks third in the NHL with 911 hits.
A lot of the offense is coming from the back end. Rangers defensemen have 28 assists this season, tied for fifth in the NHL, and 32 points, tied for ninth.
Adam Fox is at the center of it. He played his 500th career NHL game on Oct. 26, becoming the 14th Rangers defenseman in franchise history to reach that mark.
Through 14 games this season, he has 17 points on one goal and 16 assists, and his 16 assists and 10 primary assists are both tied for second in the NHL. Only Connor McDavid has more.
Fox also has a four-game point streak, a seven-game home point streak, and his 17 points rank fourth among all NHL defensemen.
Alexis Lafrenière has kept the offense moving as well. He has points in four straight games, with two goals and three assists in that span, and has gotten on the board in 10 of his last 11 games.
His nine goals tie him for ninth in the NHL, and he leads the Rangers in goals while ranking second on the team with 16 points. He has four multi-point games, tied for the team lead.
Since the 2023-24 season, Lafrenière ranks third among Rangers skaters with 78 goals and fifth with 43 multi-point games.
Mika Zibanejad has 11 points through 14 games, including three goals and eight assists. He’s second on the Rangers with eight assists and third in points, and his four multi-point games are tied for the team lead.
He also ranks 15th among NHL skaters with 127 faceoff wins. On Oct. 22, he tied Walt Tkaczuk for the sixth-most points in Rangers franchise history with 678.
J.T. Miller has found a groove too, scoring in three of his last four games and collecting points in eight of his last 11.
He has four goals, six assists and 10 points, putting him tied for third on the team in goals and tied for fourth in assists and points. His 131 faceoff wins are tied for 13th in the league, and among players with at least 230 faceoffs this season, his 56.5 percent win rate ranks sixth.
Since the 2024-25 season, his 59.4 faceoff win percentage is tied for third among NHL skaters with at least 1,000 faceoffs taken.
In goal, Dylan Garand has given the Rangers a steady home presence. He’s won all three of his starts at home and has points in five of his eight starts overall, going 4-3-1. Among goaltenders with at least three home starts this season, he ranks fourth with a .926 save percentage and sixth with a 1.93 goals-against average.
There are also a few familiar links between the two teams. Rangers defenseman Matthew Robertson is from Edmonton. Oilers defenseman Ty Emberson played 69 games for the Hartford Wolf Pack in 2022-23, and Edmonton skills coach Conor Allen appeared in seven games across two seasons with the Rangers, in 2013-14 and 2014-15.
One more note from around the league: since the 2025-26 season, Pavel Dorofeyev ranks fourth in the NHL with 21 power play goals.
In Other News...
Oilers Could Arrive Shorthanded For Rangers After Early Injury Scare
The Rangers may catch a break on the schedule with Edmonton dealing with an early injury scare from Isaac Howard, who went down after a knee-on-knee collision against the New York Islanders and needed assistance getting off the ice. For a moment, it looked like the Oilers might be facing a much bigger problem, but head coach Mike Babcock said the injury is not as serious as first feared, which at least eased the immediate concern around the winger.
Even so, Howard is expected to miss the upcoming game against the Rangers while the Oilers continue to sort through his status and adjust their lineup. Edmonton is already considering different options to fill the opening, and how it handles that spot will be worth watching for a team trying to keep its forward group intact through a busy stretch. [Read more 🡒]
Mike Sullivan Is Already Facing The Rangers Pressure Test
Mike Sullivan arrives behind the Rangers bench with the kind of rsum that usually buys a coach some patience, but New York rarely offers much of that. He steps in after Peter Laviolettes exit, inheriting a team that has already gone through a difficult first season, a front office reset under Chris Drury and the sort of retool language that signals expectations are still very much alive. Even before a full training camp has settled in, Sullivan is being asked to shape a roster that has been trying to find its footing while carrying the weight that comes with coaching in this market.
The early read is encouraging enough to make the job even more interesting. The Rangers have improved after a season in which injuries and inconsistency could have sent them backward, and Sullivan has already had to adjust his approach to fit the realities of New York pressure. With the team still in the thick of the race, the challenge is no longer just about installing a system. It is about proving that the new voice can steady a group that has to perform while everything around it keeps asking for more. [Read more 🡒]
Rangers Face A Brutal Test As Lineup Questions Linger Out Of Break
The break is over, and the schedule does not exactly ease the Rangers back in. They open a demanding eight-game stretch in 16 days Sunday at Madison Square Garden against Edmonton, a matchup that immediately asks a lot of a team trying to settle back into rhythm after time off. The Oilers arrive with Connor McDavid and the leagues highest-scoring attack, while New York is still sorting through some uncertainty on the back end because of injuries and illness among its defensemen.
Dylan Garand is set to start in goal, giving the Rangers another look at a netminder who has been thrust into a heavy workload since Igor Shesterkin went down with a season-ending knee injury. Edmonton is expected to counter with Matt Tomkins, but the bigger issue for New York is how its lineup holds up against a top-tier opponent when the blue line is not fully settled. For a team trying to navigate a brutal run of games, Sunday feels like an early stress test. [Read more 🡒]