Igor Shesterkin’s playoff plan: Have fun, see the puck, stop the puck

It’s not as if Igor Shesterkin is a rookie, or anything. The Rangers goalie played 89 regular-season games in Russia’s KHL, and 16 playoff games in that league, before he came over to the NHL three years ago.

But Tuesday at Madison Square Garden, against Sidney Crosby, Evgeny Malkin and the Pittsburgh Penguins, was to be his first NHL playoff game (if you don’t count that 2020 Toronto bubble play-in thing). So there had to be some small element of doubt about Shesterkin’s readiness, didn’t there?

Not for Rangers coach Gerard Gallant.

“There’s no issue,’’ Gallant said after Monday’s practice. “He’s well rested. Go play. Have fun. It’s the same thing we’re telling our kids; the same thing we’re telling our veterans: It’s one game at a time. It’s the playoffs. It should be fun. We had a great regular season — which means nothing now — but go play and have fun. Do what you did all year.’’

What Shesterkin did all year, of course, was put together a fabulous season for himself that will almost certainly earn him the Vezina Trophy as the NHL’s best goaltender, and is sure to earn him some votes for the Hart Trophy as the league’s Most Valuable Player. He led the league in both goals-against average, at 2.07 per game, and save percentage, at .935. He finished 36-13-4.

“Good season, I think,’’ Shesterkin said when asked about it Monday. “Not bad. I can play better.’’

If that’s true, the 26-year-old Moscow native could carry the Rangers a long way in their first playoff appearance since 2017.

Shesterkin has, technically, played one NHL postseason game, Game 3 of their qualifying-series loss to Carolina in the COVID-19 bubble in Toronto in the summer of 2020. The Rangers lost that game, 4-1, and were swept out of the best-of-five play-in round by the Hurricanes in three games. He allowed three goals on 30 shots.

That was Shesterkin’s rookie season, and he had replaced Henrik Lundqvist as the Rangers’ No. 1 goaltender before the league shut down because of COVID-19. But he sustained a groin injury just before the play-in tournament began and was unable to play in the first two games of the series.

On Monday, when asked if he would approach Tuesday’s game the way he approached playoff games in the KHL, he said instead he would approach it the same way as he would a regular-season game.

“Nothing’s changed,’’ he said in English, without benefit of an interpreter. “For goalies, you need to see the puck and stop the puck.

“But you don’t need to look around. I think [Tuesday] will be crazy in the Garden. But you need to focus.’’

In that way, Shesterkin seemed to have absorbed the message that has been sent by Gallant, who on Monday preached that playoff games are no different than regular-season games in the way they’re played.

“Nothing changes in the playoffs,’’ Gallant said. “You still put your skates on the same way. And we talked about it: The intensity in the first round is going to be jacked up five percent [from the regular season]. And everybody’s going to do that. Everybody watches the playoffs, so you know what to expect.’’

Shesterkin said he spoke a few days ago to his good friend, Islanders goaltender Ilya Sorokin, and asked what it was like playing in an NHL playoff game. Sorokin played in the playoffs last season with the Islanders on their run to the Stanley Cup semifinals.

“He told me it was a very good experience for him,’’ Shesterkin said. “And he told me, ‘Just relax and have fun.’ ’’