With 11:12 remaining in the first period during the Rangers’ 4-1 loss to the Sabres at Madison Square Garden on Friday night, Matz Zuccarello fractured his left wrist while blocking a shot from Jordon Leopold. According to the team, he is out indefinitely.
Since being recalled from Connecicut (AHL) on March 11, the 24-year-old Norwegian winger dressed for seven straight games, during which he had two goals and one assist and lit a spark under the struggling power play.
The spot Zuccarello took in the lineup will most probably go back to veteran forward Ruslan Fedotenko, who sat out his second straight game as a healthy scratch.
Fedotenko has a history with coach John Tortorella, as the two won a Stanley Cup in Tampa Bay in 2004. Tortorella had said he was going to try to get Fedotenko back into the lineup sometime in the final eight games, and now it seems like the decision of when was made for him.
“I’m not going to broadcast it,” Tortorella said Friday morning about the reason behind Fedotenko’s scratches. “I wanted to make a change in the lineup. I still have a tremendous amount of faith in Feds, as far as what he does.
“He’s been there, he’s been successful there,” Tortorella said about the 33-year-old’s playoff experience, as the Rangers still hold a one-point lead over the Penguins atop the Eastern Conference. “He understands the intensity of it, how it ratchets up, and that’s important, especially when you’re dealing with some guys that haven’t done a lot of this.”
Fedotenko said he appreciates the confidence his coach has in him, but was not willing to get ahead of himself.
“It’s nice to have that trust, but if I don’t deliver, I’m not going to play,” Fedotenko said. “The bottom line is that you never want to be sitting. It doesn’t matter if you have a history or how many years you’ve been in the league.”
Fedotenko has eights goals and eight assists in 65 games this season, but carries a team-worst minus-10 rating. He also made a point to say he needs to produce more offensively without sacrificing his defensive play.
“When I don’t play I evaluate the game and what I can improve,” Fedotenko said. “I want to help the team whose ultimate goal is to win the cup. That’s why I came back here and that’s what I want to do.”
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The scoring drought for the Rangers’ defensemen continued last night. They have just one goal as a group going back 15 games to Feb. 24. That one goal came from Dan Girardi in Monday’s 4-2 win over the Devils, and the most recent even-strength goal from a defenseman before that was from Marc Staal on Feb. 16.
“You’re always looking for offensive production form you backend,” Tortorella said. “It’s just what do you sacrifice. We want to get our guys joining, at least initially, then make a call if they stay in the offense.”
Staal paired again with the offensive-minded Michael Del Zotto, with both players finishing minus-3 as they were on the ice for the Sabres’ final three goals. Before the game, Tortorella called Del Zotto “our best defenseman joining the rush,” and said of Staal that his play “with the puck is the last part of the game coming to him. He’s getting better at it.”
Del Zotto, who played on the first power play unit, finished with two shots on net in 22:19 of ice time. Staal didn’t record a shot in 19:07.
“Obviously, I think we need to help out in that area,” Staal said before the game. “You need everybody, come playoff time, to step up and defensemen helping out in the offense is no different.”
The top pair of Girardi and Ryan McDonagh combined for seven shots, while Stu Bickel and rookie Tim Erixon had a combined three.
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Henrik Lundqvist made his fourth straight start, and though he gave up four goals, was solid in making 22 saves. The first goal came when his own player, John Mitchell, kicked the puck between his legs, and the next three all came on 2-on-1 breakaways from two of the Sabres’ most skilled players in Tyler Ennis and Drew Stafford.
“It’s tough when they can walk in a pick their corners,” Lundqvist said. “I want to come up with big saves there, and some nights I will. Tonight I didn’t.”
It was Lundqvist’s 55th start of the season, and before Friday’s game he was first among starting goalies with a 1.87 goals-against average and a .934 save percentage, along with being tied for first with the Kings’ Jonathan Quick with eight shutouts.
“Every time you go into the last few weeks, you don’t really get [tired],” said Lundqvist, whose workload has been reduced a bit compared with the previous two seasons. “The biggest difference this year was in December or late November, without playing as much as sometimes in the past, I felt fresh all the time.
“But this time of year, you’re never really tired. You just want to go play, and that’s the biggest difference for sure.”
Nevertheless, it’s expected that backup Martin Biron will get his 21st start of the season Saturday night against the Maple Leafs in Toronto.
bcyrgalis@nypost.com