Rangers sit Sean Durzi against Oilers with undisclosed injury causing blue-line shakeup
After a series of “maintenance days” with an undisclosed injury, Sean Durzi was sidelined for the Rangers’ 4-1 loss to the Oilers Sunday night at Madison Square Garden.As a result, head coach Mike Sullivan was forced to change up his defense pairs for the first time this season.Join Post Sports+ for exciting subscriber-only features, including real-time texting with Mollie Walker about the inside buzz on the Rangers.
Durzi had skated in all of the previous 14 games on the right side of the Blueshirts’ second pair alongside Marcus Pettersson, who was also traded to New York this past offseason in president and general manager Chris Drury’s attempt to restructure the team’s blue line.With Durzi unavailable, Braden Schneider was promoted from the third pair to skate next to Pettersson.On his 24th birthday Sunday, Scott Morrow drew into the Rangers lineup for the first time this season to fill in on the right side of the third pair with Alberts Smits.After making the season-opening roster out of training camp, Morrow had served as a healthy scratch for the previous 14 games.“Just view myself as being ready to go,” Morrow told The Post on Sunday morning before logging 15:02 of ice time and recording an assist on the Rangers’ lone goal.
“I’m in good physical condition and just excited to get in there.”Asked if there was any frustration with his extended time in the press box, Morrow said he understood the situation.He pointed to the faith the Rangers showed in him by putting him on the roster out of training camp, and he expressed a desire to reward the organization’s belief in him when he gets the chance.“Just got to have patience and know that whenever an opportunity comes you just got to be ready to take advantage of it,” he said.
“I’m here for a reason.It’s going to happen at some point, so just got to stay ready.
Not really stress out about things game to game, but look at the big picture and realize that if I play well,...