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Rangers face challenge of matching up with hungry Connor McDavid

If there is one justification for the NHL schedule matrix, in which every team plays home and away against all 16 non-conference opponents to the detriment of intradivision rivalries and playoff races, it’s that it means No. 97 for the Oilers will be on the Garden ice Saturday afternoon.

Yes, Connor McDavid will be in town to face the Rangers, who are bobbing on the playoff cutline at 10-7-4 after a first quarter of the season categorized as, “OK, not great. OK,” by head coach Gerard Gallant.

The same analysis likely applies to the Oilers, who, also coming off a trip to the conference finals, are 10-10-0 after going 3-7 in their last 10 following a 7-3 getaway. They will come into this one following losses at the Devils and Islanders.

McDavid shares the NHL lead with 16 goals and is alone in front with 35 points. The 25-year-old, who struck for a career high 44 goals last season, has just one in his last five games, so he will be hungry. That only will add to the task confronting the Rangers who will be matched against him.

The Oilers' Connor McDavid leads the NHL with 35 points so far this season.
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The Blueshirts have generally split the assignment between the Ryan Lindgren-Adam Fox and K’Andre Miller-Jacob Trouba defensive pairs, while Mika Zibanejad’s unit has drawn the majority of ice time against McDavid. But while moving Artemi Panarin up with Zibanejad and Chris Kreider, Gallant has constructed a Jimmy Vesey-Vincent Trocheck-Barclay Goodrow unit that might be used as a checking line against McDavid.

“I wouldn’t take them off the ice, for sure, when they’re playing against him, definitely” Gallant said of the Trocheck combination. “I’m not saying they’re going to play against them every shift, Mika can do that also, but I feel comfortable with that line on the ice against any of those lines.

“I don’t think anybody in the league likes to match up against McDavid but you’ve got to throw somebody out there.”

McDavid has 15 points (6-9) in 10 career games against the Rangers and six (2-4) in the four games between the clubs since Fox, Trouba, Miller and Panarin joined the Blueshirts and Lindgren stuck with the varsity in 2019-20.

There was, of course, the dash through the entire team that culminated in a spectacular 5-5 goal late in the third period of the Blueshirts’ 6-5 OT loss in Edmonton on Nov. 5, 2021. Trouba and Zibanejad (with Patrick Nemeth, Kevin Rooney and Dryden Hunt) were on for that one, which has been memorialized on YouTube.

That led to a question to Zibanejad of whether there is a fear of being embarrassed when matched against McDavid.

“If you’re afraid of being roasted by him, then he’s already beaten you,” Zibanejad told The Post. “You can’t sit back and be scared. You can’t give him open ice. If you do that, he’ll take advantage of that with that speed through the neutral zone.

Rangers center Mika Zibanejad, left, Oilers Center Connor McDavid face off last season.
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“This doesn’t only go for McDavid, but it’s much easier to defend top lines if you have the puck. You have to play strong on top of him and try to be smart with decision-making, but you also want to play as much offense as you can.”

McDavid recorded a goal and two assists last season in that Oilers victory in Edmonton, but was held off the sheet in the Blueshirts’ 4-1 victory at the Garden on Jan. 3. The Miller-Trouba pair was the primary match in that game, with a handful of shifts more against McDavid than Lindgren-Fox took.

“You always have to be aware of him, but you can’t forget the other guys, especially [Leon] Draisaitl,” Trouba said. “It’s cliché, but it takes a five-man unit to try and slow him down when you can.

“You know he’s building speed. You have to be ready for it. It’s like three strides coming through the neutral zone and he’s at your blue line on the attack, forcing you back. You want to stop him before he gets started.”

If Trouba and Lindgren are about positioning and muscle and if Miller is about skating and mobility, Fox is about using his formidable hockey IQ in matchups like this.

“You can’t let him wheel out of his defensive zone untouched,” Fox said. “Like any top player, but him especially, you have to take away time and space.

“But you can’t run at him, he’ll just spin away and leave you behind. You have to be smarter when you have the puck so you don’t give him good ice on transitions and you have to be smarter with your positioning as part of a five-man unit.

“You have to be extra-aware. It’s a challenge.”