NHL

Rangers eye speedy Swede

Help could be on the way Fast for the Rangers, whose inability to score is suffocating the team’s chances of qualifying for the playoffs.

Informed sources have told The Post 21-year-old right wing Jesper Fast, the club’s sixth-round selection in the 2010 Entry Draft, is awaiting release from the Swedish Ice Hockey Association and could join the Blueshirts by the middle of next week.

Fast, whose HV 71 club was eliminated from the first round of the Swedish Elite League playoffs on Thursday, is a prime candidate to play for Team Sweden in the World Championships and thus must be granted permission by the authorities in order to join the Rangers.

The speedy, 5-foot-11, 175-pound right-handed shooter had a breakout season this year, recording 35 points (18-17) in 47 games after getting 32 points (12-20) in 57 games in his first two seasons in the SEL. He had five points (1-4) in his team’s five-game playoff defeat to Linkopings.

It is entirely conceivable if management and coach John Tortorella like what they see in Fast, who is on an Entry Level contract under which he carries a $900,000 cap hit, the winger could play on a Kid Line with 21-year-old Chris Kreider on the left and 20-year-old J.T. Miller in the middle.

General manager Glen Sather first told The Post of his interest in importing Fast — who originally spelled his last name Fasth before changing it last year — during the one-week training camp that preceded the opening of the lockout-delayed NHL season.

The Blueshirts — who face the Caps at the Garden tomorrow night before a three-game road swing next week with stops in Philadelphia on Tuesday, Ottawa on Thursday and Montreal a week from tonight — have scored a sum of seven goals in regulation, going 2-4 in their last six games to slide into ninth place in the Eastern Conference.

They have scored more than one goal only once in that stretch, defeating the Devils 3-2 in Newark on Tuesday and ranked 29th overall in goals-per game through Thursday, averaging 2.27 per. Only the Blue Jackets, at 2.13 per, have been less/more offensive.

The 2.27 goals per is the Rangers’ worst mark in 58 seasons, since the hapless 1954-55 squad averaged 2.14 goals per game in finishing 17-35-18 and in fifth place in the six-team NHL.

The Blueshirts yesterday placed Jeff Halpern on waivers. If Halpern — who did not score a goal in limited five-on-five time (7:07 per) — clears, he likely will be assigned to the AHL Whale.

The Rangers could fill Halpern’s spot in the lineup tomorrow night with Arron Asham, who is expected to be healthy enough to play after missing 15 straight since Feb. 19 with lower back issues.

Or the Rangers might opt to make a recall from Connecticut; perhaps Kris Newbury, who was Kreider’s center the last three weeks when the winger scored six goals in eight games for the Whale.

Regardless, the Blueshirts, who are in need of a jump-start and in a change in the dynamic, will still require help. It could come Fast.

* The NHL has decided against taking any disciplinary action against Rick Nash, who escaped without so much as a hearing with the Department of Player Safety for his elbow to the head of Tomas Kopecky at 5:29 of the third period of Thursday’s 3-1 loss to the Panthers.