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Some new respect for the Rangers in the latest power rankings

By Steve Paulus

NEW YORK, NEW YORK - NOVEMBER 21: The New York Rangers celebrate the win over the Buffalo Sabres at Madison Square Garden on November 21, 2021 in New York City. The New York Rangers defeated the Buffalo Sabres 5-4. (Photo by Elsa/Getty Images)
NEW YORK, NEW YORK - NOVEMBER 21: The New York Rangers celebrate the win over the Buffalo Sabres at Madison Square Garden on November 21, 2021 in New York City. The New York Rangers defeated the Buffalo Sabres 5-4. (Photo by Elsa/Getty Images) /
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CHICAGO, ILLINOIS – DECEMBER 07: Members of the New York Rangers celebrate a win over the Chicago Blackhawks at the United Center on December 07, 2021 in Chicago, Illinois. The Rangers defeated the Blackhawks 6-2. (Photo by Jonathan Daniel/Getty Images) /

Older rankings

NHL.com (Dec. 2):   8th overall (behind Florida, Carolina, Washington, Edmonton, Toronto, Tampa and Calgary)

Okay, these rankings by 14 NHL.com staff are almost a week old and we will wait to see how they rank the Blueshirts next, time but even eighth seems a little low.  Since then, they have won three in a row and passed practically every team in the league.  They cite Ryan Strome’s point streak and of course, Igor Shesterkin, in making their choice.

Our take – What a difference a week could make. At the time of the rankings the Rangers had the same or fewer points than six of the seven teams ranked ahead of them. Now they have games in hand on the three teams with more points and let’s not forget that points percentage.  If they are not in the top three in the next NHL.com rankings, they need to watch some Ranger games.

The Athletic – subscription required (Dec. 3):   9th overall (behind Toronto, Florida, Washington, Calgary, Minnesota, Tampa, Edmonton and Carolina)

These rankings came before the last three games, but the Athletic ranked the Blueshirts the lowest (12th) last week, even worse that ESPN’s 10th place.   Why????  From their comments, it looks like they just don’t believe that the Rangers are that good. They did move them up from 12th to ninth.  Thanks a lot.

They cite as a positive that over the last seven games “they have the highest expected goals rate in the league at 62 percent. Pair that with Igor Shesterkin and this team can really cook.”  Okay, that’s nice to say, but then comes this. “The problem is… so can so many other teams this season. Maybe the Rangers deserve to be higher, but it’s hard to justify with so many teams playing such good hockey right now.”

They do say that the team is “trending upward” so that should be reflected in their next rankings.

Our take –  The folks at The Athletic worship at the altar of advanced analytics, something that we can respect, but they also need to use the good old eye test.  This team has some intangibles that cannot be accounted for by advanced stats.

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