From Presidents' Trophy to Punchline: How the Rangers Faceplanted Into Irrelevance

It's hard to understand how we got here. A year ago, the Rangers ruled the Metro for 24 straight weeks, hoisted the Presidents' Trophy, and came within bounces of the Cup Final. The Garden was rocking. We believed this was the start of something special.

Fast-forward to now, and they're sitting 22nd in the NHL, watching other teams prep for the playoffs while the season ends in three days—not with a bang but with a miserable crawl. The 2024-25 Blueshirts crashed and burned spectacularly, with stars like Chris Kreider, Alexis Lafrenière, and Mika Zibanejad, regressing to the means in their point totals.

Only three other teams in NHL history have pulled off this exact brand of disaster — winning the Presidents' Trophy one season and missing the playoffs the next. The last time it happened in New York? The 1992-93 boys recovered to win the Cup in '94. That's a comforting footnote. However, this version of the Blueshirts felt broken from the start.

It leaves us asking, when did It all go wrong? You could point to a dozen moments. The Barclay Goodrow situation — shipping out one of the room's emotional leaders in a shady cap move with the San Jose Sharks last summer. The Jacob Trouba drama — being stripped of the C, told to get lost, and then let back in like nothing happened. GM Chris Drury's intentional trade memo leak, starring Kreider's name , didn't help. That brutal 4-15 stretch. Kaapo Kakko, Jimmy Vesey, Zac Jones, and Calvin De Hann airing grievances to the media about playing time or their mid-March swoon after planting themselves in a wild-card spot. Take your pick.

Head coach Peter Laviolette and his staff never seemed to grasp it. The players themselves looked like strangers. The 1-3-1 structure vanished, turning their neutral zone play into swiss-cheese for opponents The adjustments were minimal, refusing to deviate from man-man in the defensive zone and paying the price when struggling to break the puck out. The power play, once extremely potent, became powerless. The positive energy on the bench and body language was nonexistent. When the Rangers figured out they were in danger of missing the postseason, the holes were too deep to climb out of.

Vincent Trocheck tried to explain it to the New York Post this week. "It's a loaded question," he said. There's a lot that goes into it." That's putting it lightly. "This team hasn't strung together three wins since November. We saw them blow third-period leads to the Anaheim Ducks, give away points in OT like candy, and skate around like they were ready to book tee times by early April.

Meanwhile, in Montreal, Jeff Gorton—yes, the former Blueshirts GM who was let go in favor of Drury in the 2021 offseason—has the Canadiens humming. They passed the Rangers weeks ago and look like a team with an identity and a future. They are watching Gorton's new project thrive into a likely playoff berth while the one he built in New York crumbles. The Carolina Hurricanes who the Blueshirts sent golfing last year, officially eliminated them on Saturday. Meanwhile, those Washington Capitals who were swept on Broadway in round one 12 months ago, are your 2025 Metropolitan Divison champions and top-seed in the Eastern Conference. Even the New Jersey Devils, despite being ravaged by injuries to their superstars made the dance. It's inexcusable for the Rangers to be in the lower-half of the league. If that's not enough, both affiliates, AHL's Hartford Wolf Pack and ECHL's Bloomington Bison, were sent home early too. The organization needs a self-investigation from top to bottom.

Yet, how will we remember this current team? Glad you asked. As a cautionary tale, the group that wasted a prime year from goaltender Igor Shesterkin. It was the season Mika Zibanejad disappeared (on pace for his worst full-season numbers since 2017-18). The core was too good on paper and too flat on the ice. After all, they were my unbiased Stanley Cup champions pick in the pre-season. Instead, season No. 99 in the franchise's history was a nosedive, and nobody grabbed the wheel.