The Rangers are heading into the All-Star break with their heads held high.

After gutting out a 5-2 win over the league-leading Panthers on Tuesday night at Madison Square Garden, the Rangers reached the 30-win mark before All-Star weekend for the first time since the 2016-17 season and just the eighth time in franchise history.

No team needed a win before the two-week hiatus more than the Rangers, who were coming off a trio of discouraging games in which they went 1-2. The fact that this victory came against the top team in the NHL was an added confidence boost that could certainly help the Rangers in the long run.

Despite struggling to contain the Panthers on the rush for much of the game, the Rangers held Florida — a team that’s averaging 4.09 goals per game — to just two goals behind goalie Igor Shesterkin’s 34-save performance.

After the Panthers tilted the ice in their favor in a 1-1 first period, the Rangers matched the visitors’ pace in the second period. With K’Andre Miller in the box for holding just over a minute in, however, Aleksander Barkov rung one off the post before Sam Reinhart buried the rebound for a 2-1 Panthers lead at 2:18.

The Rangers, in contrast to their recent performances, didn’t let the game get too far away from them.

“You’re going to have times during a game where the other team has momentum, and you’ve just got to ride it out and try to get the momentum back to your side,” said Mika Zibanejad, who recorded the first goal of the game, and an assist. “And I thought that’s what we did today. Up to this point, I feel like we all understand what our level has to be at, how we have to play, the compete level that we talk about every day.

“When we’re not really there, it’s talked about and everyone knows we have to raise our level, and I think we’ve been doing a pretty good job of that.”

Chris Kreider led the Rangers with two power-play goals — including the go-ahead tally — and an assist on Alexis Lafreniere’s game-tying score in the second period. With 33 goals on the season, Kreider is now in sole possession of the league lead as he makes his way to Las Vegas for the second All-Star appearance of his career.

Skating in his third straight game on the top line, Lafreniere took a feed from Kreider in the corner and backhanded it in past Panthers goalie Spencer Knight to knot the score at two a piece at 3:27 of the second period. It was Lafreniere’s second goal in as many games and 10th of the season.

“It’s typical of being aggressive on our forecheck and they turn the puck over,” head coach Gerard Gallant said. “But that was definitely a big part of the game and obviously the hit on [Ryan] Strome was a big part of the game, changed a lot of things for us.”

Panthers winger Mason Marchment drew the ire of the Rangers after landing a hit on Strome following a shot at 18:37 of the second period. But the Rangers’ No. 2 center got his chance to answer when he dropped the gloves with Marchment just over five minutes into the third seemingly invigorating the Blueshirts’ bench.

To cap the scoring in the third period, Kreider recorded his 17th power-play goal of the season and Artemi Panarin scored an empty-netter.

Now the Rangers will have two weeks to recuperate before tackling the final 35 games of the season. This one will surely pad their confidence.

“I think we need it, personally,” Gallant said of the upcoming break. “We played so many games on the road, we played 47 games, I think it’s the most in the league or the second most in the league. I don’t mind it.

“And the good part about the break is we’re coming back and we’ve got four great days to practice before we play our first game.”