“It’s ridiculous, just ridiculous, that I’m standing here today for this kind of an announcement,” Mike Richter was saying at Rye yesterday. “Kind of incredible, actually.”
Kind of incredible that after getting through the year with his surgically repaired knees intact, the Ranger goalie somehow would suffer a third straight season-ending injury, this one when he got hit on the side of the head with a puck.
Yet – unless the Rangers somehow make it through the all-but-hermetically sealed route to the playoffs – that is exactly what has happened.
Because it now turns out that Richter sustained a perforated eardrum and a fractured bone in the skull in addition to a concussion when he was struck above his right ear by Chris Tamer’s deflected 75-foot blast 2:20 into Friday night’s Garden loss to Atlanta. It’s the skull fracture that essentially has ended his year, given that he won’t be re-evaluated for another two weeks, and the regular-season ends two weeks from Saturday.
And to think that some people out there have believed Richter a hard head.
“Hearing you have a cracked skull is somewhat scary, but in a way it’s very straightforward because you know it’s going to heal. It’s just a matter of time,” Richter, who was hit just where the protective mask is least padded and most vulnerable, said. “I guess when this heals, I’ll have a better skull.”
Richter went for a CAT scan on Monday night after bleeding from the ear and a slight loss of hearing alerted a team of physicians – including a neurologist and neurosurgeon – that more tests were required. Results came back yesterday morning and were relayed to the goaltender after he had gone on the ice to skate on his own.
“It’s not what I was expecting, that’s for sure,” Richter, 24-26-4 with a 2.95 GAA, a .906 save percentage and arguably the team’s MVP, said. “I had been starting to feel better from the concussion, and expected to follow a fairly normal recovery rate and get back in, but now this…
“As far as what I’m allowed to do regarding working out, skating, off-ice, I haven’t had that made clear to me. But I obviously can’t put myself in a position where I’m at risk of getting hit again in the same spot.”
What that means is that Dan Blackburn, who played well in Monday’s 4-2 loss to the Islanders, will be in nets not only for tonight’s Garden match against the Flyers – a game once appealing enough for ESPN to impose an 8:08 faceoff and unimaginably long intermissions upon it – but for most of the remaining eight games. So the Rangers get to find out more about the 18-year-old.
It also means that Johan Holmqvist will get a chance, also.