Adam Edström's emergence, third line progress, more: 15 Rangers ...

MONTREAL — Adam Edström was in his native Sweden during the 2019 NHL Draft. Because of the time change, he remembers being “pretty much asleep” when the New York Rangers took him in the sixth round. That didn’t take away from the impact of the moment. His dream became a little more tangible.

“I would probably say getting drafted was when it kind of hit me that I could get (to the NHL),” he said.

Five years later, Edström has made it, at least for the time being. The Rangers put the 24-year-old on their opening night roster and he’s dressed for all five games so far this season. He has yet to score but has a plus-1 rating.

The 6-foot-7 Edström is averaging only 7:27 of ice time per game this season, down from his 8:07 per game in 11 appearances last year. The low ice time is a bit misleading. He got a game misconduct for fighting Utah’s Jack McBain after playing only 1:52 in the second game of the season. Take that game out and he’s averaging 8:50 per game. The Rangers have 58.63 percent of the expected goal share with him on the ice, per Natural Stat Trick, so he’s been pretty effective.

Jimmy Vesey (lower body) is still out. His eventual return could force the Rangers to make a decision. They could send either Edström or Matt Rempe to the minors, or they could try to sneak Jonny Brodzinski through waivers. Vesey is on long-term injured reserve and has yet to skate with the team, though he has been on the ice on his own.

I had a good chat with Edström in Detroit, and some of what I learned will lead off this week’s observations column, which will also cover both Detroit Red Wings games and Saturday’s game in Toronto. I have 15 observations this week in honor of the Rangers’ plus-15 goal differential in regulation.

1. Hockey wasn’t Edström’s only sport growing up. He also played soccer and bandy, a winter sport commonly played in Scandinavia. He was always tall, but his big growth spurt didn’t happen until his early teenage years.

“Then I kind of became the tallest guy,” he said.

Though his fight against McBain was the first of his career at any level, he’s always enjoyed the physical element of hockey. He said he tries to play the body whenever he can.

2. Edström first came to North America at the end of the 2022-23 season. He played in three regular-season games for the AHL’s Hartford Wolf Pack, then five more in the playoffs. That experience was beneficial. It helped him adjust to the ice surface in North America, which is smaller than in Europe. The next year, in his first full North American season, “I kind of felt like I was ready to go.”

3. Fellow Swede Mika Zibanejad found Edström easy to connect with as soon as they met at the young wing’s first training camp. The 31-year-old Zibanejad has seen Edström’s comfort level grow and has been “impressed more every day” with him.

“You get more out of it when you’re playing on instincts, and he’s doing so,” Zibanejad said. “I’m happy for him. I’m happy he’s here, and I’m hoping everything keeps going in the right direction.”

Having an older countryman has been helpful to Edström.

“It’s always nice as well to have a Swedish guy who you can talk Swedish with and stuff like that, if I have questions about anything,” he said. “It’s always nice to be able to go and ask him, and he’s been great. His whole family has been great.”

4. Let’s move on from Edström to another Swede: former Rangers defenseman Erik Gustafsson. He was only with New York for the 2023-24 season, but he clearly made a lot of friends while with the club. Now a member of the Red Wings, he popped by his old team’s morning skate on Monday and caught up with former teammates. He chatted with Zibanejad, hugged Adam Fox and appeared to feel Vincent Trocheck’s beard.

The veteran defenseman didn’t get into the game at Madison Square Garden but played Thursday in Detroit. The Red Wings used him on the power play, where he collected an assist late in the Rangers’ 5-2 win. He committed two penalties, though, and as he learned a year ago, the Rangers’ power play is potent. The unit scored on one of the Gustafsson-caused power plays.

5. The Rangers flashed a “Welcome back, Patrick Kane!” graphic on the Madison Square Garden jumbotron during a stoppage Monday. Kane did not appear to notice. He presumably didn’t see the gesture coming considering he was only on the Rangers for the second half of the 2022-23 season. Kane, who signed with Detroit in the middle of 2023-24, didn’t play at Madison Square Garden last season.

“I had a great experience here,” Kane said pregame. “Just the energy of the city and the energy of the building and the organization, it’s something that can’t really be matched, especially in this building. I enjoyed it so much.”

6. I confirmed with Zac Jones that he did in fact try to score a Michigan goal in Detroit. I did some research and I believe that would have been the first Michigan goal to be scored at the NHL level in Michigan.

7. Sergei Fedorov’s No. 91 is not in the rafters in Detroit. At one point during Thursday’s game, the jumbotron showed a man in a Red Wings shirt. He spun around to show that the back of the shirt read “Retire 91.” The camera quickly panned away.

8. Trocheck appeared to have a big hit on Joe Veleno behind the net in Detroit, but he said it was more incidental than it looked.

“The puck was going behind the net and we were going opposite directions,” Trocheck said. “He lost a bit of an edge.”

9. Igor Shesterkin finished Saturday night second on Evolving Hockey’s goals saved above expected leaderboard with 6.28.

10. Kaapo Kakko has taken four minor penalties in the past two games. Coach Peter Laviolette noted Kakko’s third penalty against Detroit was a bit of bad luck. He flexed his stick to see if it was broken and accidentally hit the goaltender’s stick.

“But yeah, we need to stay out of the box,” the coach said.

11. Despite the penalties, Kakko has been part of a productive line for the Rangers. The Will Cuylle-Filip Chytil-Kakko trio has the best five-on-five expected goals-for percentage (61.4 percent) of any Rangers line that has played more than three minutes this season, according to Natural Stat Trick.

“They’ve been really good,” Laviolette said. “They’ve been able to keep pucks in the offensive zone, generate chances and goals. That was the whole mindset coming into camp: put that line together, leave them alone, let them develop some chemistry.”

That continuity has paid dividends. The third line is a big reason why the Rangers’ even-strength numbers are up this season.

12. Leafs head coach Craig Berube was one of Laviolette’s assistants in Philadelphia, so they have plenty of experience together. Berube took over the team when Laviolette got fired midway through the 2013-14 season.

“He was a good coach,” Laviolette said. “He was detailed, ran good meetings.”

13. Victor Mancini came out a little early for morning skate in Toronto and took in Scotiabank Arena. He stood on the bench and looked at the empty ice and all the seats in front of him.

14. Let’s look at the last half-season of numbers from Alexis Lafrenière. In his past 41 games, including playoffs, he has 21 goals and 37 points. That’s a 42-goal, 74-point pace, and almost all that production has come at even strength.

15. The Athletic’s Corey Pronman has been going through old drafts, and it’s becoming more and more clear the 2020 draft was a total boon for the Rangers. He has Lafrenière, the No. 1 pick in the draft, at No. 3 in the re-draft. Braden Schneider (No. 19 originally) is at No. 12, Cuylle (No. 60 originally) at No. 30 and Rempe (No. 165 originally) at No. 35. Neither Brett Berard (No. 134 originally) nor Hugo Ollas (No. 197) have made their NHL debuts yet, but Pronman ranks them at No. 71 and No. 77 in his re-draft, respectively. He put both in a tier of players he believes have a chance to play NHL games. That New York is a Cup-contending team and had four homegrown 2020 draftees in their lineup against Toronto speaks highly to the draft class.

(Top photo of Adam Edström: Luke Hales / Getty Images)

Peter Baugh is a staff writer for The Athletic NHL based in New York. He has previously been published in the Columbia Missourian, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Kansas City Star, Politico and the Washington Post. A St. Louis native, Peter graduated from the University of Missouri and previously covered the Missouri Tigers and the Colorado Avalanche for The Athletic. Follow Peter on Twitter @Peter_Baugh