{"id":858697,"date":"2026-09-24T07:34:10","date_gmt":"2026-09-24T07:34:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/858697\/"},"modified":"2026-09-24T07:34:10","modified_gmt":"2026-09-24T07:34:10","slug":"rangers-adam-sykora-out-4-5-months-in-crushing-injury-blow","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/858697\/","title":{"rendered":"Rangers’ Adam Sykora out 4-5 months in crushing injury blow"},"content":{"rendered":"

Forward Adam Sykora will miss the next four to five months with a lower-body injury after exiting Monday\u2019s game<\/a> against the Devils, a crushing diagnosis for one of the promising Rangers prospects who could\u2019ve been an early call-up if injuries arose.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Sykora received his first NHL taste at the end of last season and produced three goals and four points across 11 games. He was skating as part of the Rangers AHL group throughout the start of training camp \u2014 with Tye Kartye as the left winger on the fourth line, with Matt Rempe and Jaroslav Chmelar mostly rotating on the right side \u2014 but had positioned himself to factor into the Blueshirts\u2019 plans during the season.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s real disappointing,\u201d head coach Mike Sullivan said. \u201cI feel for him. He\u2019s such a great kid. He brings so much energy and enthusiasm to the rink. I thought he was having a real strong camp to this point. It\u2019s disappointing, but we\u2019ll get better \u2014 and we\u2019ll do everything we can to help him get back in the most timely fashion. He\u2019ll be back in the mix.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

That outlook changed, at least until the end of January, when the 22-year-old skated around the corner and absorbed a crushing hit from Devils defenseman Mikael Diotte. Sykora, a second-round pick in 2022 who impressed with energetic play during his Rangers cameo, fell awkwardly into the boards and ended up hobbling off the ice with help from Anton Blidh, Liam Greentree and a trainer after initially trying to crawl his way over.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In addition to his four points at the NHL level, he collected 12 goals and 29 points in 62 games last season with AHL Hartford. When the Rangers used a lineup mostly filled with AHL players at Prudential Center, Sykora skated on the first line alongside Justin Dowling and Juuso Parssinen.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"AdamAdam Sykora (38) of the Rangers is injured during the first period of a game against the New Jersey Devils at the Prudential Center, Monday, Sept. 21, 2026, in Newark, New Jersey. Getty Images<\/p>\n

\"Rangers'Rangers\u2019 Adam Sykora (38) skates back to the bench after being injured in the first period of a Rangers-Devils pre-season hockey game in Newark, N.J., Monday, Sept. 21, 2026. Bill Kostroun for NY Post<\/p>\n

With Kartye at left wing on the fourth line and either Rempe, Chmelar or even Taylor Raddysh on the right to start, the Rangers didn\u2019t have any immediate need for Sykora at the NHL level. But his absence could lead to opportunities for other organizational depth pieces if the Blueshirts need help during the season before he returns.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Rangers spent a portion of practice Wednesday with the NHL group working on the penalty kill, but two mainstays from that unit last season \u2014 J.T. Miller and Mika Zibanejad \u2014 remained with the top power-play line the whole time. Part of that, Sullivan said, stemmed from the pair of centers already knowing the system.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

But Sullivan also expressed a desire to lower their minutes \u2014 while acknowledging that they\u2019ll still help kill penalties throughout the season \u2014 to \u201chave the ability to get a better version of them.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cMy experience has been, if you put those players, you put your top guys \u2014 they\u2019re first over the boards in every situation, power play, penalty kill, top six,\u201d Sullivan said, \u201cit adds up to north of 20 minutes every single night. \u2026 That\u2019s not to say that they\u2019re not gonna be a part of it. They certainly are. But we\u2019d like to lessen their load a little bit there.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Jonathan Quick, who retired after last season as the winningest American-born goaltender in NHL history and was hired as the Rangers\u2019 director of goaltending development<\/a>, was on the ice Tuesday with the coaching staff. <\/p>\n

During his press conference, Sullivan joked, \u201cDid you see me introduce Coach Quick out there today? His first day on the dark side.\u201d <\/p>\n

Defenseman Vincent Iorio, who also left the preseason opener early, is day-to-day with a lower-body injury. \u2026 Goaltender Spencer Martin, who took over for Igor Shesterkin in the third period of Tuesday\u2019s game against the Islanders, was placed on waivers. \u2026 Juuso Parssinen, Justin Dowling, Dennis Cholowski, Urho Vaakanainen and Bryce McConnell-Barker cleared waivers and were assigned to the Wolf Pack.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Forward Adam Sykora will miss the next four to five months with a lower-body injury after exiting Monday\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":858698,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[66],"tags":[4823,385,99],"class_list":["post-858697","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-new-york-rangers","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/858697","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=858697"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/858697\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/858698"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=858697"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=858697"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=858697"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}