The Rangers were so bad losing to Tampa Bay that The Maven felt obliged to cheer saddened Blueshirt fans with a joke but then I realized that this is no time for comedy.
What it is time for is finding out whether the Rangers are still alive.
Let's face it, there are sage folks out there such as my old pal Kevin Weekes who are beginning to wonder whether these Blueshirts are good enough to even catch a Wild Card berth.
And that's no joke either. I mean what can possibly be less funny than a home record of 2-8-1 – (and don't be a smart aleck and tell me 0-10-1.)
For starters let's start with the fact that yesterday's 4-1 defeat to Tampa Bay could have been 14-1 the way MSG's rink was tilted in the Visitors' favor.
Dull, drab, desultory and deplorable are some of the kinder words to describe the efforts of Mike Sullivan's team.
Right here I'd ordinarily give you Sully's take on the Blueshirts' D-minus effort but the general feeling is that it was the worst performance of the tepid season so far. Sully's "We gotta be better" words are ridiculously redundant and, therefore, not worth repeating.
Not surprisingly there were alibis galore for the one sided humiliation. The best – or worst, as the case may – was as follows:
The Blueshirts Are Winning, Yeah, But!
For a club with a three-game winning streak and being above the .500 mark (13-11-2), the <a href="https://thehockeynews.com/nhl/new-york-rangers">Rangers</a> hardly can be called a red-hot Cup contender.
New York was playing its third game in four days and, therefore, the lads were tired. Tut-tut, is what I say to that. Tampa Bay also was doing the three-in-four routine and not hissing and moaning about it. Just winning 'em all.
What's more, coach Jon Cooper's outfit entered the game without its core blueliners – Victor Hedman, Ryan McDonagh and Erik Cernak; not to mention ace sharpshooter Brayden
Point.
So, what's the point? Simply this; so far when the Rangers play an elite team at The Garden, they react as if they're skating against a Beer League outfit from Chelsea Piers.
The difference being that Gitler's Gorillas would be trying ten times harder!