On the same night the Steven McDonald Extra Effort Award was handed out, the Rangers’ inconsistent effort led to a 3-2 shootout loss to the Sabres on Monday at the Garden.

The Blueshirts looked like a team that didn’t have much to play for at times and Buffalo fought tooth and nail to keep its playoff hopes alive all night, which allowed the visitors to tie it up in the third period before Owen Power and Casey Mittelstadt scored in the shootout to secure the victory.

As a result, the Rangers lost out on another opportunity to pull even with the second-place Devils in the Metropolitan Division standings.

The Devils are set to play the Sabres on Tuesday night in Newark, where they will have a chance to jump into first place in the division and clinch home-ice advantage.

Carolina had an opportunity to secure home ice with a win over the Senators on Monday, but the Hurricanes lost 3-2.

Playoff seeding in the Eastern Conference is still very much up in the air as the regular season winds down.

“It’s a battle,” head coach Gerard Gallant said after the loss, in which Artemi Panarin (two goals) and Mika Zibanejad (one assist) both reached 90 points on the season. “Fortunately, we’re in a good spot right now. We’ll see what happens in the standings over the next few days. You look at the battles below us and those teams are battling right now, like Buffalo was tonight.”

With Game No. 82 on Thursday, individual Rangers accolades have started to roll out.

In an emotional ceremony on Monday night, Ryan Lindgren was announced as the 2022-23 Steven McDonald Extra Effort Award winner as voted by the fans.

In true Lindgren fashion, he spent the final minutes of overtime in the locker room after blocking a Jeff Skinner slap shot with his face before coming back to the bench for the shootout.

“He well deserves that award,” Gallant said of Lindgren, who is in his fifth season with the Rangers. “I know he’s done it since I’ve known him, for the two years I’ve been here, that’s what the kid does. Every night, he puts his heart and soul out there and plays hard.”

The honor, which has been given annually since the 1987-88 season, is awarded to the Rangers player who “goes above and beyond the call of duty.” It bears the name of the NYPD detective who was shot and injured in the line of duty on July 12, 1986 before he ultimately passed away on Jan. 10, 2017.

Lindgren became the third defenseman to win the award, joining Adam Fox (2019-20) and Brian Leetch (1996-97). This season, the 25-year-old has recorded career highs in assists (17) and points (18).

As beneficial as Lindgren’s on-ice statistics are for the Rangers, the Minnesota native brings much more to the team than meets the eye.

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“It is my honor to present this award to the player who has become the heart and soul of this building,” NYPD Lieutenant Conor McDonald, the son of the late Steven McDonald, said before announcing Lindgren’s name.

Lindgren is a motor for the Rangers. He is a glue guy and the kind of player who exerts 100 percent each and every game.

There are no numbers that tell the full story of what Lindgren means to the Rangers, who can look like a shell of themselves whenever he is not on the ice.

“That means a lot,” Lindgren told The Post when reflecting on Conor McDonald’s words. “The way I want to play the game is — I want to be a guy that brings it every night and is competitive and can help this team in any way. To hear that was pretty special.”