Russian striker “Rangers” Artemy Panarin, after not the most successful playoffs last season, learned from the mistakes. And he honestly shared them with the American media, touching fans and journalists with his honesty.

Panarin remains Panarin!

“Very predictable!”

The Rangers media day for journalists began with a smiling Panarin: although his English still leaves much to be desired, the Russian did not disappoint, starting to joke right off the bat. At first, he explained that the choice of the new captain of the Rangers – Jacob Truba – approves. Why?

“Because I don’t speak English,” he mistook, drawing laughter from the locker room.

Photo: © KHL / Bezzubov Vladimir

But Panarin was not going to joke that day. Although the new season is already on the nose, he decided to go through the results of the old, not the most successful one for him personally, making a frank confession:

“I played too much on my wing, because it is easier for others to adjust in this case,” he said. And made some mistakes that shouldn’t have happened.

Panarin admitted that he lost confidence in the playoffs. The forward needs to rethink his approach to the game.

“Now I need to be on the ice everywhere and at once,” the Russian continued. — It will help me to progress and complicate the game for my opponents. And, of course, it will help my partners, because before that my game was a distribution of passes on the boards. Very predictable! Therefore, the partners could not develop anything from this that they should have.

And what was it?

It looks like Artemy did a summer of work on the mistakes, having carried out a complete analysis of his unsuccessful game. And was it really a failure? After all, the Rangers reached the conference finals.

On the one hand, yes, the Rangers have taken a step forward. For the club from New York, the past season was marked by the almost unmistakable game of Igor Shesterkin, who became the unofficial MVP of the team, won the Vezina Trophy for the first time in his career and was almost the most talked about hockey player in the NHL.

Panarin almost reached the top 100 points in the regular season, scoring 96 points, but in the playoffs he seemed to lose himself. His link was not as effective as it could be, he himself was not effective in his usual position as a playmaker, and when playing in equal lineups, he was literally invisible on the ice. Yes, he chalked up 16 (6+10) points, but in terms of performance he became only the third in the team. In general, this is not how New York represented the game of the highest paid forward.

Photo: © Evan Buhler / Keystone Press Agency / Global Look Press

“Thank you for being so conscientious”

According to North American insiders, Panarin’s performance last season did not cause positive emotions in the club. At the very least, GM Chris Drury “verbally complained about his performance.” Most of all, the Rangers fans were indignant, who could not contain the negativity and flooded social networks with upset and angry comments about Panarin’s actions.

But a Russian who hasn’t used social media for a long time doesn’t need to read insults on the Internet to understand what mistakes he made in the last playoffs. He himself expects more from himself, which he made clear in his sincere comment to the media. Rangers fans literally melted from Panarin’s honesty:

“It’s cool that he is so honest,” wrote one of the fans in the comments on social networks. – In fact, we would not have made it to the playoffs without his great game. This season, I’m sure Panarin will turn into a beast.

“God, thank you for being so conscientious,” wrote another Rangers fan. – And then last year Panarin was the most overrated player.

In addition to the support of the fans, the Russian also has coaching support. Gerard Gallan noted that he had already discussed changes in the game with his star.

– We talked 2-3 weeks ago, and Panarin said that he wants to play more at the gate, – said the mentor. “And I told him that we would like that too.

The point is small: to realize their intentions and really turn on the “beast” mode, not only in the regular season, but also in the playoffs, for which the Rangers have big plans.