PRAGUE----Good morning, all...Yesterday, Czech Republic native Petr Prucha believed he wasn't going to dress for tonight's game against Tampa.
This morning, however, Prucha and assistant coach Perry Pearn had a heart-to-heart discussion along the boards near the red line at the morning skate here at O2 Arena, and a visibly relieved Prucha will play tonight, likely on the third-line with center Lauri Korpikoski and Ryan Callahan.
"Yeah, I'm playing, I'm glad," Prucha said after the optional practice during which 10 forwards and seven defensemen skated. "I didn't think I was going to. I was on the fifth line. The coach told me he wanted to try a different look." Instead, the scratches will be Fred Sjostrom, Patrick Rissmiller and Dan Fritsche.
My report that Prucha, who will have more than 20 friends and family here, was furious yesterday and dodged a TV interview apparently caused a fan furor out there in the blogosphere. But Rangers coach Tom Renney said he hadn't reversed course on Prucha.
"I didn't change my mind, I made up my mind," said Renney. "I think Petr's had a good camp, he's been a little bit snakebitten offensively, but he's had chances as much as anybody on our team, and we need to score to win. The fact that he would be energized is not going to hurt us at all. But that's not unusual for Petr, we could be playing in Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan and he would play the game the same way. It was just one of those things, I contemplated it all day yesterday and last night."
Comments (1)
wow, I had to read 75 posts yesterday blasting Renney for not playing Prucha in his homeland.
I guess that is just wasted time I will never get back.