NHL

PUNISHMENT PRACTICE FOR RANGERS

A half hour of slothful practice this afternoon accounted for 30 minutes more than Tom Renney could bear.

So the head coach of the Rangers stopped the workout and proceeded to punish his players with a final half-hour of sprints, crossover skating drills and rink-width laps all conducted without pucks.

This marked the first Punishment Practice of Renney’s four-year reign, and it came with the Rangers enmeshed in a three-game losing streak (0-2-1) during which they have scored a sum of three goals.

The fifth-place Rangers are eight points clear of the ninth-place Hurricanes and 10 points up on the 10th-place Penguins with 30 games to go in the season.

“We had a pretty good practice lined up, I thought we were going to do some good things, but maybe that was the best thing for us,” said Renney, who shouted expletive-laced commands at his players several times during the early portion of practice. “There’s been an inconsistency in our commitment to doing the little things that a team that wants to win on a regular basis needs to do.

“So this was an attention-getter.”

But was it necessary?

“I don’t know,” Markus Naslund said. “It’s not the first time I’ve been a part of that, but I guess that’s what the coach felt was necessary to get his point across.

“We know we have to play better, we know we have to score. If Tom thinks we’re not scoring because of a lack of effort, I guess that’s why he asked us to skate.”

If the Punishment Practice was inflicted upon the team to make a point, we’ll get our first idea how successfully the point came across on Friday night when the Blueshirts meet the Stars in Dallas.

“It was a good old-fashioned bag skate,” Chris Drury said of the final half-hour that was conducted in silence, save for Renney’s whistle and clipped instructions. “We weren’t having the practice that was expected, plus I’m sure it was some response to our last few games.

“Tom wanted to make sure we get back in the right direction and get our heads in the right place so that we’re ready for a big game against Dallas.”

Renney, whose team has scored 18 goals in going 5-4-1 in the past 10 games, said, “The message had better [sink in] because the season comes on you real quick, so do the teams chasing you, and those in front, their tail lights become smaller and smaller.

“Now is the time to step up.”

*

Artem Anisimov did not take part in the practice. The freshman center, who played 9:02 capable minutes in his NHL debut in Tuesday’s 2-1 shootout loss to the Thrashers, was returned to AHL Hartford. That seems to mark the end of the Brandon Dubinsky-Drury-Nikolai Zherdev line that showed substantial promise through portions of the match. Dubinsky will move back to the middle after one game on the wing. … Dimitri Kalinin (lower back) did not skate.