Lafreniere main topic of discussion in Montreal

MONTREAL — Hometown boy Alexis Lafreniere was swarmed by local media at the morning skate Thursday before the Rangers played the Canadiens at Bell Centre. The fact that the former No. 1 overall pick was scratched for a game last week against Tampa Bay was naturally a topic of discussion at Gerard Gallant’s pregame media briefing.

Gallant said the Rangers are happy with Lafreniere at this stage of his career and insisted scratching him one game doesn’t mean they are unhappy with him. Gallant did concede that the pressure on Lafreniere to produce big scoring numbers is high, given his draft status.

“You’ve got to put that away,’’ he said of Lafreniere dealing with media pressure. “You can’t worry about all you people . . . We try and give him positive information all the time. Coaches try and help him. We’re not in there yelling at him and saying, ‘You’ve got to be better, you’ve got to do this.’

“I think he’s going to be a great player,’’ Gallant said. “But there’s guys in front of him right now and it makes it tough for most kids.’’

n Brodzinski unavailable

Forward Jonny Brodzinski’s wife went into labor Thursday and Brodzinski left the team to be with her. With Brodzinski unavailable, the Rangers called up forward Gustav Rydahl from AHL Hartford to serve as the extra forward.

Rydahl (6-3, 209) has four goals and five assists and 24 penalty minutes in 24 games for Hartford, with a plus-2 rating. Rydahl and defenseman Libor Hajek were the scratches.

n Going for the gold

“We’re going for the gold medal tonight,’’ center Filip Chytil, a Czech, said as he walked into the locker room after the morning skate. Czechia faced Canada in the gold-medal game of the World Junior Championships.

Chytil was asked if he was bummed he wouldn’t be able to see the game.

“I’ll be watching it on the bench, on the iPad,’’ he joked.

Rangers prospects Brennan Othmann of Canada (first round, 2021 draft) and Jaroslav Chmelar of Czechia (fifth round, 2021) were in the final.