The goaltender was injured during a 3-1 loss to the Washington Capitals on Friday. He appeared to injure his right leg at 8:20 of the second period when his skate got stuck in the goal post as he rushed toward his net.
Shesterkin’s leg bent awkwardly beneath him as he fell into the crease. The 30-year-old had to be helped off the ice by Rangers defensemen Sean Durzi and Marcus Pettersson and was unable to put weight on his right leg.
“It’s horrible,” Rangers captain JT Miller said after Friday’s game. “He’s a pillar of this team. It stinks. Obviously, it’s (early). We don’t even know what’s going on, but to see him leave the game is a blow to all of us, a shock to all of us. But at the same time, it means we have to put ourselves in a man’s shoes to try to get the job done, especially (Garand).”
Shesterkin stopped 13 of 14 shots before leaving the game and was replaced by Dylan Garand, who made 11 saves.
Shesterkin is 3-1-0 in five starts with a 1.79 goals-against average and .927 save percentage this season. He also scored his first NHL goal in a 5–1 win over the Tampa Bay Lightning on October 1, firing the puck up the ice into an empty net at 17:26 of the third period, with goaltender Andrei Vasilevskiy pulled for an extra attacker.
Shesterkin won the Vezina Trophy as the NHL’s top goaltender in 2021-22 and is in his eighth season with New York after being selected by the Rangers in the fourth round with the 118th pick of the 2014 NHL Draft. He is on the second of an eight-year, $92 million contract signed on December 6, 2024. He has an average annual value of $11.5 million, making him the highest-paid goaltender in NHL history.
“It’s definitely not a good feeling for anyone to see someone on your team go down, especially a guy like him who’s kind of the pillar at the back,” New York defenseman Adam Fox said. “You know, it (stinks). Obviously, we hope the best for him.”
Shesterkin, who won the Vezina Trophy as the NHL’s top goaltender in 2021-22, missed 13 games last season after suffering a lower-body injury in the first period of a 3-2 overtime loss to the Utah Mammoth at Madison Square Garden on Jan. 5. season.
The Rangers are already missing backup goalie Joonas Korpisalo, who will be out four weeks with a lower-body injury.
Garand was recalled from Hartford of the American Hockey League on October 1 after being granted waivers and being sent down on September 28. He made 22 saves for his first NHL shutout in a 2–0 victory over the Detroit Red Wings on October 2. The 24-year-old is 3-1-1 with a 1.31 GAA, .954 save percentage and one shutout in five career NHL games (four starts).
New York (4-2-0) hosts the Vancouver Canucks on Sunday (6 p.m. ET; MSG, SNP).
NHL.com Senior Writer Tom Gulitti contributed to this report
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