NHL

RANGERS WORK ON ‘POWER’ GAME

ANAHEIM, Calif. – Even if the power play worked at 75-percent speed during practice here yesterday, at least it worked.

That is a start for a Rangers’ team that will enter tonight’s match against the Ducks with a 20-11-2 record despite a power play that’s ranked 22nd in the NHL at 14.2 percent, while allowing nearly half as many goals (10) as it has produced (22).

“I think that our overall team psyche has at least been bruised by the problems we’ve had on the power play, and I think that the impact has grown over the last two weeks,” coach Tom Renney said after the 45-minute skate that concluded with 10 minutes of work on the power play. “It’s taken a toll on our offensive players on that unit.”

The Blueshirts worked to address these issues yesterday with makeshift PK units attempting to provide a semblance of opposition to the two PP units Renney appears to have settled upon, at least for the short-term.

One unit features the Markus Naslund-Scott Gomez-Nikolai Zherdev first line with point men Wade Redden and Dan Girardi. The other is comprised of Chris Drury, Brandon Dubinsky and Aaron Voros up front with Paul Mara and Michael Rozsival on the blue line.

“We tried to make it more like a scrimmage where there was resistance down and back,” Renney said. “We may not have done enough of that with all of the [other areas] we’ve worked on, on almost a daily basis.”

Chris Drury, who said that his BU team practiced the power play using lighter pucks to encourage more game-condition opposition from the penalty-killers, said he believes there’s merit to working on the PP even at walk-through speed.

“I think there’s a value to being out there with your unit and learning what guys want to do and where they want to go,” he said. “We need to get something going out there that we can feed off.”

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Mats Sundin, who was scheduled to fly to Toronto yesterday on personal business, instead remained in New York, The Post has learned. The free agent center is expected to choose a team by Friday.

“I’m keeping my fingers crossed,” Markus Naslund said. Naslund told Sundin on Saturday that he would not be subject to the same media or public scrutiny in New York as he would in a Canadian city.

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Sean Avery has officially been placed in Stage 1 of the NHL/NHLPA Behavioral Health Program, The Post has learned. Avery, who has told friends he is committed to the counseling program in order to rebuild his career, is a non-roster player who continues to be counted against Dallas’ cap.

larry.brooks@nypost.com