Rangers unable to recapture comeback magic of last season

By the time the 2024 playoffs began, the Rangers had already constructed their reputation — their 114-point, Presidents’ Trophy-winning one — around what happened when they weren’t winning games, and it didn’t take long for that to appear in the playoffs.

They snatched Game 2 of the second round from the Hurricanes after trailing by a goal in the third.

They did the same in Game 3 after trailing by one after 20 minutes.

And then in Game 6, behind by two and staring down the potential for a do-or-die finale, Chris Kreider erupted for a third-period hat trick to propel the comeback that ended the series.

The Blueshirts kept finding ways to add cardiac and resilient and never-say-die as labels that could get attached to the front of their name, with the 28 comeback wins in 2023-24 after trailing by a goal setting a team record.

On 14 occasions, they erased a deficit of at least one goal in the third period and escaped with a win, and six times, they erased a deficit when trailing by two goals at any point in the game.

Without that trait, and without the innate ability to produce some wizardry when needed most, the Rangers likely don’t end up atop the NHL standings.

And with five games remaining one year later, that has become abundantly clear.

The Rangers — one year after the 28 come-from-behind victories, as well as two and three years after their 21 and 27, respectively — have collected just 15 comebacks, and they haven’t won a game when trailing by two goals all season.

Another example unfolded Monday night, when they allowed three Lightning goals across two minutes late in the first period and never came close to recovering.

The Blueshirts, on the brink of elimination six points behind the Canadiens for the final wild-card spot entering Tuesday night, lost their comeback gene, never recovered it and are situated nowhere near the top of the league.

“Last year, we were going into third periods down two, three goals, and we were coming back and winning those games,” forward Jonny Brodzinski said Monday following their loss. “That’s the difference between last year and this year. Bottom line is just putting pucks in the back of the net. We gotta bear down in those small opportunities that we get in the O-zone.”

An inability to produce comebacks is far from the only thing that has spiraled into a disaster for the Rangers this year.

They still haven’t won three in a row since November.

They still had collected just two power-play goals across the past 16 games, a skid that only received a reprieve when a puck bounced off Mika Zibanejad’s skate and into the net Monday.

Everything, Artemi Panarin said, has been more difficult for the Rangers in “both zones — O-zone, D-zone.”

Despite most of the core from last season returning at the start of the year, the Rangers weren’t able to replicate their late-game heroics on most occasions.

Exceptions emerged, but for the most part, when they trailed — and especially in the final frame — they never recovered.

The Blueshirts have won just five games in 2024-25 when trailing by a goal in the third.

They lost the game long before that stage Monday, in the eyes of Peter Laviolette.

First, Nikita Kucherov deposited the puck into the net on the power play.

Then, Yanni Gourde turned a broken sequence into an ugly goal near the right.

And after Sam Carrick was quickly whistled for a cross-checking penalty, Brayden Point sent a shot past Igor Shesterkin to give the Lightning a three-goal lead that only Zibanejad’s goal sliced into.

When asked about the inability to recreate their “magic” of last season, with the lack of comebacks an underlying layer to that, Laviolette’s succinct answer served as a telling one.

“We needed to win a game tonight we didn’t win,” Laviolette said. “So there’s been a lot of that through the course of the year.”

The Rangers have lost a lot of things this year. Recently, they’ve squandered any degree of momentum in the playoff race. They’ve lacked production from veterans such as Kreider and Zibanejad — and they’ve lost plenty of games, too. But they also relinquished some of their most crucial genetic code, too, and it has turned every remaining game into a must-win — and every remaining point into a must-get. Even that, though, might not be enough.

“We just gotta win out now,” Brodzinski said. “It’s no longer kind of a waiting it out kinda thing, where we win a game then we’re waiting to see what they do. We have to win out, and then we need help, too.”