The New York Rangers have put their fans into the best worst position in sports, win or be upset. That’s something that is great and confusing, how can you watch a sport for fun yet be so miserable. Ask any fan though and they want their teams to be one of the top teams in their sport and that comes with the misery.
What the Rangers have done in recent years is build a great hockey team capable of winning the Stanley Cup. It’s not uncommon to see the Rangers at the top of the standings in the last couple of years and it’s even more common to see this franchise make a deep playoff run. In the last five years the Rangers have made three conference finals appearances, a statement we can make for very few other franchises over the last couple of decades or so. This type of run puts New York up there with the Los Angeles Kings and Chicago Blackhawks.
One problem with that comparison though, the Kings and Blackhawks have five Stanley Cups between them, the Rangers have zero. That puts New York in a Stanley Cup or bust situation.
Over the last two years the Rangers have made the Stanley Cup Final, losing to the Los Angeles Kings in five games, a tough five game series filled with overtimes that could have gone either way. Last year they came so close to making the Final again after trailing the Tampa Bay Lightning in the series 3-2 they fought off elimination on the road putting up a huge 7-3 score and taking momentum home for game 7. In the end it didn’t end up well for New York losing on home ice in game 7 0-2 crushing dreams of winning the Stanley Cup again.
You can blame plenty of things and I’m sure Rangers fans do, this player, that player, this or that decision by the coaching staff. One thing stands out to me is the home record in the Tampa Bay series, the Rangers were 1-3 on home ice. New York won the Presidents Trophy as best team in the league and the right to play four game 7’s on home ice if needed and they couldn’t make it pay off. Not only did they lose three of the four home ice games in that series they were shut out the final two games on home ice. In both game five and seven the final score was 0-2. Bottom line, I don’t care who, if you’re the star of the team or not, someone has to find a way to score. Game seven was up for grabs for the longest time and no Ranger could find a way to get a goal that’s what lost the series.
Luckily for the Rangers this series loss didn’t end their chances. The team is still filled with great players and players in the right time of their careers. If you take out Henrik Lundqvist as the goalie and best player on the team who is thirty-three Rick Nash is the oldest player on the skaters side at thirty-one. The rest of the key players on this team are on the good side of thirty. That sets up a pretty good future and many chances at the Stanley Cup.
There isn’t that much the Rangers have to work on either. They were one of the best teams in the league in goals for per game and goals against per game 3.02 and 2.28 respectively. That was the best average distance in the league, the next highest was actually the Tampa Bay Lightning who had a goals for per game at 3.16 and a goals against average of 2.51. With the countless advanced stats popping up and people trying to gain and edge that way, keep it simple, the Rangers were one of the highest scoring teams and one of the best teams on defense last season and it equaled a Presidents Trophy and a trip the the conference finals.
The only thing the Rangers need to work on is faceoffs being that they were one of the worst teams at that last season at 46.7% and their power play wasn’t good either. If you talk to me power play is a luxury to have, penalty killing is a must, you will never see a team win the Stanley Cup with a bad PK but you’ve seen teams and seen teams recently win the Cup with bad power plays. If New York can get a good power play it will help but it’s not a must.
New York didn’t need a huge shakeup in terms of the roster and they won’t really be getting one. A couple of trades, they traded Carl Hagelin a key player, but they got a pretty good young player in Emerson Etem who can provide depth. Cam Talbot was also traded a really big part of the Rangers season last year but bottom line they don’t need him, Lundqvist will be the guy for years to come and they acquired backup Antti Raanta from the Chicago Blackhawks who is fine if Lundqvist picks up an injury. Free Agency again proved to be depth moves for the Rangers with the signings of Viktor Stalberg, Raphael Diaz and Jarret Stoll. Not anything big but some guys you can probably call upon if you need them in the playoffs.
The Rangers didn’t lose anything, their biggest loss is probably Hagelin and we’ll see who can fill his void, but someone will fill it. Cam Talbot was a great player for this team but he was ready to be a starter and it wasn’t going to be with this team. Other then those two player it was Martin St. Louis who retired and at that stage of his career, not really that big of a loss.
The Rangers have been contenders for years and have set themselves up to be contenders for years to come. I try to tell fans of all winning teams, try to enjoy it, it’s easy to get caught up in the now and what has to be done to get better and you sometimes don’t get to enjoy the times but someday you could be looking back on these days and ask yourself, “where did those good times go?”. Sit back and enjoy the ride, but make no mistake about it, it is Stanley Cup for bust for the New York Rangers.
