How quickly things change.
This time last year, the Rangers were in the midst of a historic regular season showing and they were closing in on securing just the fourth Presidents’ Trophy berth in franchise history.
They went on to cruise their way through the first two rounds of the playoffs before running into the eventual Stanley Cup champion Florida Panthers -- who eliminated them in six games during the Conference Finals.
Fast forward to Saturday, and they were eliminated again -- only this time much earlier.
New York has been dancing on the edge of the Eastern Conference Wild Card race over the past few months -- but they’ve failed to take advantage of those opportunities and the Carolina Hurricanes sent them packing with just two regular season games left.
“It’s disappointing for everybody,” head coach Peter Laviolette said.
“We earned it last year, we certainly didn’t earn it this year,” Vincent Trocheck added.
The Rangers did start the year winning 13 of their first 17 games -- but then things took a turn for the worst as they dropped 14 of their next 19 in regulation, and GM Chris Drury decided to send out a league-wide memo making numerous veterans available for trade.
Drury ended up moving on from all of the team’s impending free agents and shipped out captain Jacob Trouba while also bringing in some reinforcements ahead of the deadline -- which improved play a bit.
Still, they were unable to find the production and consistency they showed last season.
New York did close the gap in the race for the final Wild Card spot to just handful of points at the beginning of April -- but as was the case for the majority of this season, they weren’t up for the challenge.
They are now the fourth team in NHL history to miss the playoffs a year after taking home the Presidents’ Trophy.
“The disappointment is real,” Laviolette said. “This wasn’t anybody's plan coming into the year, especially coming off of last year. We had the opportunity over the last 20 games to make some noise and make our own way and we didn’t, so that’s on us.
“We haven’t played well enough to win hockey games and that’s what makes it frustrating. I believe this team is good enough to win hockey games and good enough to make the playoffs, but we’re not in it -- that’s the reality, we didn’t do the right things.”
So where do the Rangers go from here?
They have numerous questions to answer over this summer -- but first they have to get through two more regular season games: Monday night against the Panthers and then Thursday back home against the Lightning.
What exactly will they be playing for at this point? Trocheck says "pride" -- that's about all they have left.
