The New York Rangers are running out of time if they want to make the 2025 Stanley Cup Playoffs. After topping the Eastern Conference last season, they're in danger of crashing out in just a single year's time.
With five games remaining in the regular season, the Rangers are still six points out of the final wild card spot after falling 5-1 to the Tampa Bay Lightning on Monday. Fans at Madison Square Garden made their displeasure with their team's recent form (3-6-1 in their last 10 games).
Not many fans were left, but they made their displeasure known at the end of New York’s 5-1 loss to Tampa Bay.
— Peter Baugh (@Peter_Baugh) April 8, 2025
There are five games left, and the Rangers are six points out of a playoff spot. pic.twitter.com/V8lXAV1srH
The Rangers have confounded experts in how serious a drop off the franchise has exhibited with little to no roster turnover from the previous year. Ironically, the team New York swept in the first round of the playoffs in 2024, the Washington Capitals, have now replaced them as kings of the Eastern Conference and could succeed them as President's Trophy winners.
Rangers coach Peter Laviolette appears checked out after latest loss
Typically, the players, media and fans alike will look to the head coach for some inspiring words or a change in strategy to reinvigorate the team. Rangers head coach Peter Laviolette has no such words apparently.
Does Laviolette have a message for the team at this stage?
— Vince Z. Mercogliano (@vzmercogliano) April 8, 2025
"I don’t have a message right now. I don’t go into the locker room after the game."#NYR
"I don’t have a message right now. I don’t go into the locker room after the game," Laviolette told reporters after Monday's loss.
Those comments raised some serious eyebrows across the league. They were eerily reminiscent of former Philadelphia Flyers' bench boss John Tortorella's words just days before he was shown the door.
"This falls on me. I’m not really interested in learning how to coach in this type of season, where we’re at right now," he said on March 25. "But I have to do a better job. So this falls on me, getting the team prepared to play the proper way until we get to the end."
At least Tortorella's comments sounded like they had some semblance of accountability attached to them. Laviolette seems to think just letting his boys stew on a loss will snap them out of their funk. Well, it looks like he's let think long and hard enough to just tailspin the rest of the way out this regular season.
Laviolette has one year remaining on his contract signed in 2023. His first year at the helm could be enough to stave off a firing but he's definitely on thin ice after the disappointing follow up this season.