Three reasons the Rangers will be taking a big step forward this season
By Jim Lynch
The future top line is going to find an entirely new level in 2022-23.
The 2022 playoffs were fun to watch for many reasons, one of which has to be the kid line in New York. Filip Chytil, Alexis Lafreniere and Kaapo Kakko made up the kids line this past season. They were the quote-on-quote third line for this team after Zibanejad and Ryan Strome and now in 2022-23, they will start to take that next step forward into the top six at times.
I doubt the three will stick together as one line for the entire season, but without a doubt, this was a great move by Girard Gallant to let the three young guns all play together. Kakko and Lafreniere were only 20 this past season and Chytil was only 22.
Those three players are the future of this team as they have the potential to be elite stars all being former first-round picks including Lafreniere who was drafted first overall. If they all take even just a small step forward this team will be better because of it.
Whether it be their confidence improving after a trip to the Conference Final, or their ability to just play taking a leap forward, this 2022-23 season is going to be fun to watch for the three of them.