NOT BRAD: The Rangers’ Brad Richards practices yesterday with the NHL regular season set to begin tomorrow. (Anthony J. Causi)
The point regarding the Rangers’ power play, which the club worked on yesterday in its penultimate rehearsal for tomorrow night’s opener in Boston is the unit has its best chance to be formidable if Brad Richards is on point, on the point.
Richards was at the back yesterday with Michael Del Zotto across from him while Rick Nash, Ryan Callahan and Marian Gaborik formed the combination up front on the first unit. Marc Staal and Dan Girardi were on the points on the second unit with a forward line of Derek Stepan, Carl Hagelin and Brian Boyle.
Conspicuous by his absence was Chris Kreider, who averaged 0:59 per of power-play time during the playoffs. Hagelin rarely got into the man-advantage unit last year, averaging 0:20 per during the regular season and 0:26 in the tournament.
Coach John Tortorella clearly believes ice time must be earned, but Kreider’s shot is just as clearly a weapon. Of course, this was one day of practice.
“I didn’t look into all of it and it’s an ever-changing situation; same with the penalty-kill,” said Tortorella. “We’ll see the guys play and make decisions from there.”
It was, however, a day for Richards to return to the quarterback position on the point he had mastered throughout his career until he struggled a year ago and eventually moved to the middle for much of the season and pretty much all of the playoffs.
“I know I can be better back there, I have been almost my whole career, and I know I have to be better than I was last year,” Richards, who skated with the team for the first time after being down with the flu, told The Post.
“But I think the way I played at the point was just a reflection of my overall game, which wasn’t where I wanted it to be, certainly not the first half,” he said. “My start kind of put me in a hole.”
The Rangers had the eighth-poorest power play in the NHL last year, producing at just 15.7 percent while blanked in 51 of 82 games. The performance improved in the playoffs, with the Blueshirts fifth-ranked at 17.8 percent.
Nash, a big man with soft hands and vision, can either play in front or on the wall. Gaborik, who scored a large number of goals from the dirty area around the net, remains a sniper who can set up at a trigger spot or in the corners. Callahan can both pick it and scoop up loose change.
“Having Nash up front should help me at the point, the way he can use his body on the wall to shield the puck and then either drop it down low or come back with it,” Richards said. “It’s going be a fresh look, and I should be able to see everything.
“Having that vision has always been one of my strengths, but it was clogged up a bit in my head last year and I wasn’t feeling free with it. I’m thinking that was a function of the time it takes me to respond to change.”
Richards is an avowed creature of habit. Moving to a new city and onto a new team, as he did after signing as a free agent in July of 2011, were obstacles.
“I don’t know what it is about me, but I need to be able to go on auto-pilot,” Richards said. “Being here now for over a year, living here for most of the summer and staying through the lockout has really helped me.
“I’m much more comfortable. And I’m expecting that to translate onto the ice.”