New York Rangers 1st Round Exit Might be a Blessing in Disguise

New York Rangers Left us Numb

There I was, sitting in front of the TV watching the time dwindle down to 0:00. The Penguins players gathered around their rookie goalie Matthew Murray, who came into the series in game 3 after recovering from a head injury. The Penguins had just knocked the New York Rangers out of the playoffs in 5 games, with this game ending with a score of 6-3.

The series was embarrassing. The New York Rangers gave up 5 or more goals in 3 of the 5 games and looked like they didn’t belong in the same rink as the 2nd seeded Penguins, but yet, it didn’t faze me. I felt nothing.

Usually, when the Rangers get knocked out of the playoffs, I generally get this weird feeling in my stomach, the kind of feeling you get when somebody that is close to you passes. The feeling tends to stick with you for a couple days, weeks or months, or sometimes, even years later (like the 2013-2014 playoffs), but this time; nothing. It’s like, I knew this was going to happen, like I had no hope for this team, and I guess that is partially true.

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Even though before game 5 I wrote an article which’s sole purpose was to pump Rangers fans up and to get them to believe the team could comeback, but no matter what I told myself I couldn’t bring myself to believe, and if you had watched this team at all during the season, you would know that my feelings were justifiable.

The New York Rangers Were Not a Letdown

After starting the season 15-3-2 due to exceptional play by goaltender Henrik Lundqvist– who looked like he was in mid-season form right from the get-go—and exceptionally good puck luck, the team got pretty full of themselves, and so did the media around them. While New York Rangers fans and bloggers were super happy that the team was winning, there were some obvious weakness in the team’s game that some noticed, which created some unrest. These things weren’t being talked about by the team’s beat writers or head coach, Alain Vigneault.

The beat writers continued to rant on Twitter and in their columns about how they had never seen a fan base be so upset with their team’s performance while they were in first place.

Then the middle of the season happened…

All the glaring holes in the team’s game started to take the forefront, continuously costing the team games. Whether it was a lack of goal scoring, horrible defensive coverage by certain players, a horrible powerplay and an even worse penalty kill—something that had been a strength of the team for years prior to this season—the team was free falling down the standings. The news was finally out; Zed was dead, and the New York Rangers were no longer the Rangers of old.

It was the beginning of the end.

The Silver Lining

After taking a little bit of time to sit back and reflect on the season, I have started to believe that losing the way the Rangers did to the Penguins was the best thing that could’ve happened to this franchise, right now. You may think I am crazy for saying this, because yes, the team got completely embarrassed in that series, but bear with me here.

This season, at least in the first few months, showed that as long as the team was winning games, no matter how fluky some of those wins were, they weren’t going to make adjustments. If the New York Rangers made it past the first round and either lost in the conference semifinals or the conference finals, the team’s management might have been blinded to the many changes that became apparent that they need to make.

Team owner James Dolan has already come out and said he would like the team to come out next year younger and faster. There are not many things me and James Dolan agree on—ticket prices definitely being one of them—but I could not agree anymore with this assessment (I wish he was this smart about the Knicks all of these years…).

It’s not only the Rangers management that needed to realize the weaknesses of the team, it was also Alain Vigneault, who failed to make any adjustments when they needed to be made late in the season or in the playoffs, which made the Blueshirts any easy team to play against because they were so predictable.

Alain Vigneault’s Laundry List of Mistakes

Vigneault made so many questionable decisions all season long, I’m just going to bullet point everything he did that made me and most other Rangers bloggers shake our heads because honestly, the list is very long.

• Not getting the most out of star players like Rick Nash.
• Playing Kevin Hayes all around the lineup without consistency.
• Jesper Fast getting top 6 minutes.
• Tanner Glass being in the NHL.
• Dan Girardi not seeing reduced minutes or being scratched.
• Keith Yandle not being on the top powerplay unit for half the season and not getting his minutes bumped up for half the season.
• The constant blaming of guys who weren’t really deserving of blame, giving them short leashes (i.e. Yandle, Miller, McIlrath, etc.) and defending/finding excuses for guys who were playing even worse, while continuing to play them without any chance of a benching. (Girardi, Marc Staal, Glass)
• This one is more for Ulf Samuelsson and Scott Arniel, but the complete and utter failure of the special teams.
• Playing the 4th line when your down multiple goals in a playoff game.

I’m sure if I really wanted to, I could continue to go on and on, but you get the point. This is also partially on the media, too. The beat’s job is to ask questions and get answers. They did neither. With the exception of a select few guys (Sean Hartnett is one of them), many people on the New York Rangers beat just didn’t get it. They never asked Vigneault the tough questions to get the answers that the fan base wanted to know, like why does Glass give the team a better chance to win than, well, any other forward in the NHL or AHL? Why Dylan McIlrath barely played, and even in games he did play,  when he was obviously playing much better than Girardi, Staal or Boyle was, why did he never get solid minutes? The media has to put the pressure on Vigneault and make him think, and they didn’t do that, thus, they failed.

Vigneault has acknowledged thus far into the offseason that changes to the core are likely coming, so that is a positive, but talk is cheap. Until the New York Rangers do something major, I am going to go out on a limb and say much will remain the same.

Does that mean a Rick Nash or Marc Staal trade won’t happen? Does that mean Dan Girardi will not be bought out? Does that mean Keith Yandle will not re-sign? I don’t know the answer to any of these questions, but the Rangers have some time to figure these answers out while 8 other teams continue to play hockey.

New York Rangers Season from a Players Perspective

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From a player’s perspective, losing so early could be a good thing for a couple of reasons. The Rangers have played 80 playoff games in the past 4 years. That means the core of this team has played essentially 5 seasons in the last 4 years. You have to imagine, even given how competitive athletes are, that it has worn on the players a bit. This short exit will give the team some time to sit back and rest for an extra month or two to get ready for next season.

The second reason is this early exit can serve as motivation. I think the team started to get a little bit lazy and complacent this season—which can explain a lot of the blown 3rd period leads — and some of the players, including goalie Henrik Lundqvist acknowledged this in his exit interview. I think losing this way, this early will make the players realize they are nowhere near where they need to be, and that a lot of work needs to be done to get back to where they used to be.

I think a majority of the Rangers’ fan base has reached a conclusion: the Blueshirts are at a major cross road, and this offseason could be one of the most important offseasons in team history. Many people are saying that the Rangers are done, that the window to win the Stanley Cup has been slammed shut. It might not be easy, but there is a way to keep that window open, but it is going to take a lot of work by second year General Manager Jeff Gorton.

While all of that is fine and dandy, that will require a completely different article which I will write, so fret not.

Zed might be dead, but who says the New York Rangers can’t be Lazarus?