NHL greats Wayne Gretzky and Mark Messier call on the New York Rangers to bring back this ONE key player for Game 2 of the Eastern Conference Finals vs. Panthers

A number of NHL legends have called on the New York Rangers to bring one key rookie back to the lineup on Friday night.

The Blueshirts play a crucial Game 2 of the Eastern Conference Finals in front of the home crowd at Madison Square Garden.

After this game the series turns back to Sunrise, Florida - home of their Finals rivals the Florida Panthers.

Down 1-0 in the series, a trio of Rangers legends - Wayne Gretzky, Mark Messier, and Hendrik Lundqvist - are calling on coach Peter Laviolette to bring back rookie enforcer Matt Rempe to the lineup.

Messier, who works for ESPN as an analyst, said on Wednesday night, 'Maybe they should think about putting Rempe in the lineup'.

Gretzky and Lundqvist, who are both part of the panel on TNT's coverage of the sport, both spoke in favor of his return saying that he could make an impact against a very physical Panthers team.

Rempe, who joined the team from the AHL Hartford Wolf Pack this past winter, stood in awe that legends of his franchise were calling for him to play.

'It's unbelievable. Those guys are legends. To be talked about by them is pretty damn cool,' he said. 'If I get an opportunity, I want to make most of it. I don't want to let anyone down.'

He added: 'I'm 21. I have no pressure. I just want to do the most. If I know that I work my hardest, I can look myself behind and say I'm proud of myself.'

But Laviolette stayed strong in his decision that the coach would be the final arbiter of who's in and who's out.

'Any decision that I make is based on the conversations that we have as a group internally here,' the coach said. 'I can't really make my decisions based on that. 

'The players that we do put in the lineup, we're hoping that they have a positive impact inside the game.' 

Rempe has garnered a reputation for being one of the most promising young fighters in the National Hockey League at a time where fighting is dying out.

The physical presence of the 6-foot-8 fighter could be enough to contend with a Panthers team that brought a lot more energy and dominated in Game 1.

Rempe hasn't been on the ice since Game 5 of the second round of the playoffs against the Carolina Hurricanes. The fourth-liner has a goal and an assist in seven games in the playoffs.

While Gretzky and Messier may be on-air rivals now, they were teammates twice in their long and storied NHL careers.

First, they won four Stanley Cups in five seasons together between 1984 and 1988 with the Edmonton Oilers before Gretzky was traded to the Los Angeles Kings.

Messier would win another title with Edmonton in 1990 and then would bring the Rangers their most recent Stanley Cup title in 1994.

From there, they would meet up again in New York when Gretzky signed with the Rangers as a free agent in 1996. 

They played together there for one season before Messier became a free agent himself and signed with the Vancouver Canucks the following season.