The past week has been a whirlwind for the NHL, beginning with the 2026 Draft on June 26 and June 27 and continuing with a frenzy of free agent signings and trades being made across the league.
As the dust begins to settle, it’s time to take a first glance at how the Rangers roster could look next season under head coach Mike Sullivan.
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Forwards
Rangers president and general manager Chris Drury spent much of the past seven months expressing his desire to build a younger, faster, and more dynamic Rangers offense. Drury stuck to his word, and the blockbuster addition of Pavel Dorofeyev from the Vegas Golden Knights via trade means that the Rangers top forward line should look and play very differently next season.
Dorofeyev is physical, aggressive, and intelligent as a forechecker, gets into dangerous areas off the puck, and puts away goals by the bucketload. The 25-year-old Russian winger is a two-way star who draws plenty of attention from opposing defenses, meaning he should make life a lot easier for his projected linemates, center Mika Zibanejad and winger Alexis Lafrenière.
Elsewhere in the lineup, Will Cuylle, Noa Laba, and Gabriel Perrault are talented young players each entering the final year of their current contracts, meaning they will all be restricted free agents (RFAs) in the summer of 2027. Cuylle is out to prove that he can be more than a decent middle-six forward following two straight 20-goal seasons. Meanwhile, Laba and Perrault should see increased playing time, and with it, the opportunity to break out into reliable pieces of the forward core.
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The Rangers also brought in free agents Oliver Bjorkstrand and Joe Veleno, both on one-year contracts. Bjorkstrand is a crafty winger who lost a bit of his scoring touch last season with the Tampa Bay Lightning, but remains a useful playmaker who can hold his own defensively. Veleno is a fourth-line center who saw his faceoff percentage and penalty kill usage reach career highs last season with the Montreal Canadiens.
The Rangers still have a good chunk of cap space to work with, so don’t be surprised if they’re not done adding to this new-look group, as the team’s depth chart looks a bit thin when it comes to bottom-six forwards.
Defensemen
The duo of Adam Fox and Vladislav Gavrikov is one of the most dynamic and dangerous top-line defensive pairings in the NHL. The issue is that Fox played just 55 games last season due to injuries, and with Fox out of the lineup, the Rangers were a putrid 8-16-3 in 2025-26. As a result, this offseason, the team’s front office looked to ensure that the Rangers have multiple defensive pairings which can provide offensive production and puck possession (rather than just one, Fox and Gavrikov).
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The performance of New York’s brand new second line defensive pairing of Sean Durzi — acquired from the Utah Mammoth in the Vincent Trocheck trade — and Marcus Pettersson — acquired via trade from the Vancouver Canucks — will be a massive factor in whether the Rangers can return to the playoffs next season. Both players join the fray in the prime years of their career, and on paper, their combined skillsets fit very nicely. Durzi is a right-handed defenseman who is a point producer for himself and his teammates with strong offensive zone passing skills. Pettersson is a left-handed defenseman who is no slouch offensively, but really excels by doing the dirty work: retrieving pucks, eating hits, blocking shots, and killing penalties.
The third-line defense for the Rangers projects to be another lefty-righty pairing in the form of Urho Vaakanainen and Braden Schneider. Vaakanainen is a no-frills defense-first defenseman who played just 34 games last season for the team, but held his own and proved that he’s worthy of a full-time spot as a depth piece in the lineup moving forward. Schneider, once tipped as a surefire top-four defenseman for the present and future of the team, has seen his stock fall significantly over the past couple of seasons, and currently slots in as a talented but inconsistent bottom-line defenseman. Schneider is currently an unsigned RFA, and although the Rangers just extended Schneider with a one-year qualifying offer, it isn’t certain whether he’ll be wearing Ranger blue or a different team’s uniform come the fall.
Fifth overall selection Albert Smits was considered by many to be the most “NHL ready” defenseman in the 2026 draft class, but the Rangers will likely be in no rush to insert the 18-year-old Latvian draftee into their lineup. Still, Smits could feature at some point in 2026-27, and should be a player worth watching for years to come.
Goaltenders
Igor Shesterkin missed 13 games due to injury in 2025-26. In the 31 games without their franchise netminder between the pipes, the Rangers went 9-20-2 (this includes games where Shesterkin was rotated out of the starting spot, a common occurrence for “workhorse” starting goalies). When healthy, the 30-year-old is one of the best goaltenders on the planet, able to turn potential losses into wins with stunning stops which demoralize the opposition.
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The Rangers acquired Joonas Korpisalo from the Boston Bruins, who will compete with Dylan Garand for the role of Shesterkin’s backup. Korpisalo is vastly experienced for a 32-year-old (still in his prime in goalie years), as he will enter his 12th NHL season with a proven track record as a solid backup goalie. Garand, meanwhile, made waves despite playing just three games towards the tail end of last season. In those three starts, the 24-year-old posted a .954 save percentage, saving 3.9 goals above expected as the Rangers went 2-0-1. Garand will be looking to carry over that momentum into next season.
