The Rangers are ill. How else can one describe a team that has scored a grand total of 1 goal in four home games?
What's wrong with a team where its fourth line is better than the other three? Is there an answer?
Yessiree, Bob. And, believe it or not, the Blueshirts' sickness was best articulated by retired MSG Networks Ranger analyst Joe Micheletti immediately after he retired last Spring. Joe said it then and it holds more than ever now:
"THE RANGERS LACK SPIRIT!"
The Maven had figured that new coach Mike Sullivan would have cured the absence of spirit. And if not Sully then new captain J.T. Miller most surely would; that's why they got him for the second time around. But it didn't work and here's why:
SPIRIT: Where was it on opening night when the team should have been flying for 60 minutes to hail the new home season? Instead, the high-paying fans got to see a team of low-skating mummies.
SPIRIT: Where was it on Monday – Centennial Night – when MSG honored the first (1926-27) Rangers team of all-time. In skating hard to memorialize the 1928 Blueshirt Cup-winners this current melange of millionaires owed the fans vim, vigor and vitality. Alas, the spirit just wasn't there.
Impossible For Rangers To Play Any Worse
Well, at least the <a href="https://thehockeynews.com/nhl/new-york-rangers">Rangers</a> scored a goal in the first period last night at The Garden – that's progress.
There's an old saying, "When the spirit moves you, you shout Hallelujah; you shout Hallelujah, yes indeed."
Indeed, but you need spirit to score more than one measly goal in four home games. Joe Micheletti said it then and it holds more than ever now.
There's no spirit on these Rangers. But there does seem to be a few fat cats.
No? Yes!