No matter the coach, Adam Fox’s defensive partner remained consistent through his first six NHL seasons with the New York Rangers. Whether David Quinn, Gerard Gallant or Peter Laviolette was behind the bench, Fox almost always played alongside Ryan Lindgren, his friend dating back to their days at the U.S. National Team Development Program.

According to Natural Stat Trick, the Lindgren-Fox pair skated at least 600 five-on-five minutes together in every season since Fox entered the league in 2019-20. Fox won the Norris Trophy as the NHL’s best defenseman with Lindgren by his side in 2020-21, and the Rangers reached two Eastern Conference finals with them as partners. All the while, though, New York did not commit to Lindgren long-term, and a difficult individual start to the 2024-25 season contributed to general manager Chris Drury trading him to the Colorado Avalanche at the March deadline.

Now, with Lindgren in Seattle on a four-year free-agent contract, Fox needs a new partner.

Deciding who to play with Fox on the Rangers’ top pairing will be among the biggest decisions for new coach Mike Sullivan heading into fall. Drury turned to free agency to provide a compelling option, signing Vladislav Gavrikov to a seven-year deal worth $7 million in average annual value. The 6-foot-3 Gavrikov was one of the league’s best shutdown defensemen last season with the Kings.

“When you really watch him closely — just his foot positioning, the way he positions himself between the puck and the goal — he’s just always in the right position,” said one Western Conference-based NHL scout who frequently watched Gavrikov in 2024-25. “You have to play through him. … He just neutralizes you. He’s just so smart about it. He makes it look easy.”

On paper, slotting Gavrikov on the right-handed Fox’s left side is the obvious move — the best possible pair that the Rangers could make.

“More than anything, he’s a safety valve that lets Fox have more risk in his game,” the same scout said.

Another NHL scout, based in the Eastern Conference, similarly saw potential benefits in putting the offensively gifted Fox with a strong, defensively minded blueliner.

“I could definitely see them being used as a pair together,” the scout said. “Gavrikov is a bigger guy, really good at breaking up plays, good stick. Fox is way more of that new school offensive puck-mover. Their playing styles are different and they’re built completely differently physically. Maybe the differences can complement each other.”

Fox played at least 100 minutes at five-on-five with three partners in 2024-25, according to Natural Stat Trick: Lindgren (611:31), K’Andre Miller (314:46) and Carson Soucy (146:38). In total he commanded over 50 percent of the five-on-five expected goal share, per the website, though just barely with Lindgren (50.02 percent). With the Miller-Fox or Soucy-Fox pairings on the ice, New York had more than 60 percent of the expected goal share.

Fox’s counting stats took a dip in 2024-25, with 61 points compared to 70-plus in each of the previous three seasons, primarily because the Rangers’ power play struggled. But his underlying numbers were still elite.

The Kings similarly enjoyed at least 50 percent of the expected goals share when any pairing with Gavrikov was on the ice last season (minimum 15 minutes played). If Gavrikov plays at the high level he did in 2024-25, there’s reason to believe he and Fox could instantly become one of the NHL’s best pairs.

“I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s what you see in training camp or preseason,” said a Western Conference executive. “It gives you a chance to put your best two defensemen on the ice at the same time for 20-24 minutes every night, which is always a great option.”

Gavrikov and Fox have both shown they can carry a pairing on their own, which could lead to Sullivan splitting them up, at least for part of games. The coach could play someone like Braden Schneider — a right shot who played on the left early last season — or Soucy with Fox for long stretches of the game, then put Gavrikov and Fox together for shifts in key situations.

“If you’re not a pair (the whole game), then you are in the last four minutes of a period, five minutes of a period,” the Western Conference executive said. “You make your adjustments. With TV timeouts and team timeouts, you have options to keep them on the ice together for an extended period of time.”

Sullivan’s decision on Fox’s partner will have a trickle-down effect on the rest of the lineup. Fox and K’Andre Miller were strong partners for the Rangers in 2024-25, but Laviolette frequently split them up so the rest of the lineup had more balance.

If Sullivan stacks the top pair with Gavrikov-Fox, then two of the following players would need to make up the second pairing: Will Borgen, Schneider, Soucy, Urho Vaakanainen and Scott Morrow. None of them have ever averaged more than 18 minutes a game in a full season. One Eastern Conference executive noted that New York has traded away Lindgren, Miller and Jacob Trouba, all of whom averaged 20 minutes at least once in their Rangers career. That’s a lot of minutes to replace.

“I don’t know how just the one signing (in Gavrikov) is going to make them back to contending for the division,” he said. “That’s their challenge.”

The Eastern Conference executive views Schneider, who is 23 and coming off labrum surgery, as a top-four defenseman, but sees Borgen as more of a No. 5 or 6. (He noted, though, that sometimes players can find chemistry with another defenseman and rise higher in the lineup than they’d otherwise be slotted.)

The Eastern-based scout liked Borgen’s play after New York acquired him in the Kaapo Kakko deal in Dec. 2024, viewing him as a legitimate top-four option. But the scout added that in his estimation, the Rangers currently have “closer to a top three” than a top four.

“I could also see that leading to them possibly breaking up Fox and Gavrikov if you wanted to balance it out a little bit more,” he said.

The roster, of course, is not finished. The Rangers are close to the salary cap right now, but if they stay under without using long-term injured reserve they can accrue space before the deadline. Then they could try to trade for another defenseman. That could come at the expense of adding to the forward group, which also could use bolstering. (We’ll get to that in a future story for this series.)

“Do they have to add someone (at defense)?” the Western scout said. “Maybe. But I don’t mind their D.”

But the right combinations could also just take time to figure out. Pairings sometimes take time to jell.

“That’s not one of those (things) you can analyze purely through analytics or pure(ly) through the eye test or pure(ly) through statistics or anything,” the Eastern Conference executive said. “It’s, ‘Do guys read and how well do they read off one another? Do they compliment one another?’ And that’s art to me.”

(Photos of Vladislav Gavrikov and Adam Fox: Alex Gallardo and Pamela Smith / AP Photo)