BOSTON — The odds were stacked against the Rangers from the start Saturday afternoon. 

The Rangers, who suited up 16 skaters instead of the usual 18 due to a combination of injuries, a suspension and cap constraints, might not have been able to defeat the NHL-leading Bruins even at full strength, let alone two players short. 

Still, this was no cakewalk for the Bruins, who are now sitting on a 15-point cushion at the top of the NHL after handing the Rangers a 4-2 loss at TD Garden. 

“They’re at the top of the league now, and that’s where we want to be,” defenseman Braden Schneider said after the game. “I think we can skate with them and I think we can play with them. I think we gave them a good run today and I’m excited for us to get clicking and get some guys back, because I think we can give them a good run for their money.” 

More stock would’ve been put in the Rangers had they been at full strength.

Without two of their top defensemen, Ryan Lindgren (upper-body injury) and K’Andre Miller (final game of a three-game suspension), as well as fourth-liner Tyler Motte (upper-body injury), it’s difficult to fairly evaluate the Rangers when they were at a clear disadvantage. 

That didn’t come through in the Rangers’ play as much as expected. The Bruins, who have now won 10 straight games and have beaten the Rangers three times this season, are just a force of nature. 

Neither team gave up much in 60 minutes of tight-checking, 200-foot, back-and-forth hockey.

The Rangers were solid in the defensive zone at times, but not so much at other times. 

The Rangers may have had their sticks in the passing lanes and they may have played well along the boards and in the corners, but the Bruins’ seamless and speedy transition game was difficult to contain.

The Bruins doesn’t just hem opponents in their zone, they hound them in. 

And for a Rangers team that has been shorthanded for three consecutive games (four if you include when Ryan Carpenter and Braden Schneider were benched for roster-management reasons against the Kings), it has been apparent just how much of a toll — mental and physical — it has taken on the team. 

“There was a lot of good,” head coach Gerard Gallant said. “But there was some bad, too.” 

Boston, which doesn’t even have 10 losses yet this season, has allowed the fewest goals in the league by a considerable margin.

Linus Ullmark has been one of the best goalies in the NHL this year and the Swedish netminder stopped 24 of the 26 shots the Rangers threw at him. 

Rangers goaltender Igor Shesterkin had one of his better performances in a while, making 20 saves, but it wasn’t enough in his 11th loss of the season.

The Bruins were able to run the score up a bit behind goals from Patrice Bergeron and David Pastrnak in the third period, while Alexis Lafreniere recorded his second goal of the game (he also scored on the power play in the second period) with 1:26 left in regulation to minimize the damage. 

The Panarin, Kane and Vincent Trocheck line saw the bulk of the action on both sides of the puck.

The Rangers’ second line, which was just too loose on defense, was out-attempted 12-6 and was on the wrong end of a 3-1 edge in high-danger chances, according to Natural Stat Trick. 

Integrating Kane into the Rangers’ lineup is still a work in progress, as is the rest of the team’s chemistry.

It’s been an incredibly long week for the Rangers, who won’t play again until Thursday and will need every second of those four days to regroup. 

The Rangers should be back at full strength Thursday in Montreal. That’s when the real work will begin.