Vitali Kravtsovs role with the Rangers

It looks like the Rangers will have Vitali Kravtsov spend the full season in the KHL. This confirms what we thought back in August, when the Rangers initially loaned Kravtsov to Traktor. The confusion was with the recall option. The Rangers have the option to recall Vitali Kravtsov from the KHL, but they likely will not use it.

This makes sense, as the Rangers are pretty loaded on wing and adding Kravtsov to the mix would complicate things for this season. This is an evaluation season for a lot of players, and some decisions at wing and center are going to be needed.

Of course, this doesn’t eliminate the options of Kravtsov coming over this season. The KHL season, including playoffs, ends in April. At that point, the Rangers will be at most three months into the season. At that point, injuries may have taken its toll and the Rangers need Kravtsov. Or perhaps they want him to play big minutes in the AHL.

There’s still a chance the Rangers bring Kravtsov over after the season for some AHL and/or NHL time. However it is now extremely unlikely the Rangers bring over Vitali Kravtsov via recall from the KHL. Expect him over in April, or whenever the Traktor season ends.

Share: 

Mentioned in this article:

More About: