5:44PM: David Quinn spoke after practice today and said (NYR):

• On practice today, “I liked their effort, intentions and obviously it wasn’t going to be the prettiest practice but I thought their effort was good and focus was good.”
• How is Panarin, “100%, he’s ready to go.”
• On the post All-Star approach, “Our approach is to put ourselves in the best position to win a hockey game tomorrow night. It really is that simple, and we are that shortsighted. That’s all it comes down to. We are disappointed in how our last two games have gone, we need to learn a couple of lessons through those two games and we will see if we learned them starting tomorrow night.”
• Do you get involved with bigger picture discussions, “We have such an open dialogue between all three of us that inevitably all the conversations you talk about everything. That is never my purpose or intention or my job, my sole responsibility is to coach the players that are here and coach our team. They ask me my opinions on certain things of that nature and I just think it’s normal hockey dialogue when the coach, President and GM get together and talk.”
• Does coming out of the break this year feel different than last year, “I think we are a very confident group and feel good about the direction we are going and feel pretty good about how we have been playing. Certainly not happen with the results of the last two games and even the last game against the Isles, some of those stats can be misleading, a little too much fluff to them. We outshoot them 40 to whatever, it was too perimeter, we were too perimeter and our guys understand that. We understand what we need to do to reward ourselves for spending 6-plus minutes more in the offensive zone, that doesn’t mean anything if you are just skating around the perimeter, big deal. We need to spend more time inside offensively and our guys understand that.”
• Is Strome okay, “yea, a little bit of the flu so he came off halfway through. I anticipate he’ll be fine tomorrow.”
• On changing the defense pairs, “haven’t loved a couple of the pairings and we’ve been talking about switching the pairings for the last 3-4 games and just wanted to see what these pairings look like to see if we can get better production.”
• On moving Lindgren to play with Trouba an endorsement of him, “yes. I think Lindgren and Fox have been really good. We were hesitant to break them up because of that but we have been toying with it for a while and it’s the right time to see how it looks.”
• On Trouba and Lindgren together, “There has been some inconsistencies but the thing I really like about Lindgren, that has surprised all of us, is his ability with the puck and how he has been able to get us out of our end. Troubs, when he’s on his game, does that as well. It’s a gut feeling, want to see how it looks. They both play with a bit of a snarl, maybe they can give us that more consistent shutdown d-pair we are looking for. We will see how it goes.”
• Was there concern about Panarin, “you never know, we were confident he was going to come back at 100%.”
• How do you handle the goalies the rest of the year, “just a constant open dialogue. We talk quite a bit, it’s not an ideal situation for the goalies or the coaches or anybody really but they’ve all done a great job handling it. They all want to play, I want them to play and to be pissed off when they are not in there but they don’t let it get in the way of their work ethic or what goes on in that locker room and they’ve done a great job handling the situation.”
• On the bigger picture with the goalies, “there is a lot that goes into those conversations and the planning. It was a quirky situation where we play the Isles in 3 of 4 games and Georgie has such a history against the Isles and he played those three games. Our schedule dictates a little of what goes on and who plays who, but the one thing we want to make sure of is that there is clarity and we’ve all been on the same page.”
• “Shesterkin tomorrow, Hank will play Saturday.”
• Can Henrik still be a number one goalie, “yes.”
• On wanting to win and needing to develop guys, “it’s challenging but the good thing for us is that all of these young players have handled these situations well. It’s a balancing act as a coach that you are aware of that you don’t want to sacrifice winning and losing yet you also want to give a player an opportunity to develop. One of the things that we talk about within our organization is that guys are going to make mistakes, our game is a game of mistakes but why are you making a mistake. Is it because of laziness, softness, those are the things you can’t turn a cheek too. Sometimes the only way to develop is to make mistakes but what are your intentions throughout the game, are you making mistakes because you are playing with the wrong intentions, there is a lot that goes into that.”
• Why Hank in Detroit, “I had a choice to play a goalie that has played two games or a goalie who has been on the beach for nine days, I chose the goalie that has played two games and been playing hockey.”

3:50PM: Igor Shesterkin will start for the Rangers on Friday against the Red Wings at MSG. (Stephenson)

Henrik Lundqvist will start on Sunday in Detroit. (Stephenson)

The lines and defense pairs used at practice today were (Stephenson):

• Chris Kreider, Mika Zibanejad, Pavel Buchnevich
• Artemi Panarin, Ryan Strome, Jesper Fast
• Brendan Lemieux, Filip Chytil, Kaapo Kakko
• Brett Howden, Greg McKegg, Brendan Smith
  • Ryan Lindgren, Jacob Trouba
  • Brady Skjei, Adam Fox
  • Marc Staal, Tony DeAngelo