Regarding the Rangers, who have been sputtering from game-to-game despite the 6-3-1 record since returning on Feb. 15 from their hiatus.

1. The silver lining of the 5-2 loss Tuesday night at Minnesota is that the lopsided affair allowed head coach Gerard Gallant to limit Adam Fox’s ice time to 19:31. That was his lowest complement of the year, other than the 15:01 he got in the Jan. 27 match at Columbus, which he departed after the first shift of the third period with an upper-body injury.

Fox has played the seventh-most minutes in the NHL over the last two seasons, averaging 24:19 this season and 24:42 in 2020-21, which was a 56-game season. The game Thursday night at St. Louis will mark the Rangers’ 58th game, with 24 to go.

The 5-foot-11, 180-pound Fox has played 24:00 or more 32 times — and the wear has begun to show. He has made a few more mistakes than customary, both with and without the puck. He and faithful companion Ryan Lindgren have the third-best goals for and against percentage among pairs with 600:00 at 57.38 and ninth-best among tandems with at least 500:00 at five-on-five.

But the pair has been on for six for and seven against since Feb. 15. And, though expected goals for percentage can be subject to interpretation and should never be cited as a universal measure, it is instructive regarding trends. Lindgren and Fox are under 50 percent at 49.37, as opposed to the 57.08 from last season.

There are instances when Fox is trying to do a little too much. He is getting caught a bit more often, lacking the sheer foot speed to negate errors. There is also far more attention being paid to No. 23 by the opposition. The focus on game-planning against the third-year pro will only increase as the games become more important. He will find more forecheckers in his face.

When coaching against Bobby Orr and the Bruins in the 1974 Stanley Cup finals, coach Freddie Shero had his Flyers dump the puck in No. 4’s corner at every opportunity in order to get a piece of him, slow him down and wear him out. Shero used a similar tactic, from behind the Rangers’ bench in the 1979 semifinals, against Denis Potvin and the Islanders. Fox should expect that kind of thing this spring.

It is going to be critical for Gallant to manage Fox’s ice time down the stretch. That was the coach’s intention coming into the season, after he indicated as much in training camp. But that has been easier said than done.

Gallant could reduce Fox’s minutes by using Braden Schneider in his place on selected penalty-kill assignments. Fox is getting 2:16 per on the PK, second to Lindgren’s 2:22. Schneider is at 0:43. That is an area which Gallant (and assistant coach Gord Murphy, who oversees the PK) should address.

2. This is a recording. Something is off with Artemi Panarin, who somehow has gone 13 straight games, since Jan. 27 at Columbus, without scoring a five-on-five goal. He also has one in the past 22 games and two in the past 29. He is scoring 0.5 goals per 60:00, the lowest five-on-five rate of his seven-season career, well below the 0.9 from last season and the 1.2 from 2019-20.

Panarin has looked ordinary too much of the time. Effervescence and explosiveness have been lacking in his game. Precision passes through traffic are not getting through. There are far too many turnovers at the offensive line. He has been hesitant. Allowing for the fact that this sensitive son of Russia may have much on his mind, this has been an ongoing issue for months.

Several sources have suggested that Panarin may feel constrained playing for Gallant, whose system is more structured than that of predecessor David Quinn, with an emphasis on chipping pucks out of the zone on the breakout. Hence, there are fewer home-run passes, fewer odd-man breaks through the neutral zone (unless triggered by Igor Shesterkin) and less open ice on which Panarin can work.

If there is truly an issue here, it must be resolved. The Rangers can bolster their third line, they can add depth on defense, but if Panarin is a pedestrian, the Blueshirts will be going nowhere.

3. Nights like Tuesday, on which Patrik Nemeth had a challenging game, make me fear that the Blueshirts will indeed wind up paying too much in order to rent Ben Chiarot from Montreal.

The definition of “paying too much” is in the eye of the beholder, but mine would be the inclusion in the exchange of a first-rounder, or Nils Lundkvist, or Zac Jones, or Matt Robertson, or Filip Chytil, or Brennan Othmann, or Will Cuylle, or Vitali Kravtsov or Brett Berard.

4. Of all the potential rentals, the one who would make the most sense is the one who made the most sense even before the season started. That would be Vegas’ Reilly Smith, whom the Golden Knights still might have to move if there is an intention to bring Mark Stone off long-term injured reserve before the end of the season.