Basically, every NHL franchise is bursting with pride with its Olympians it wishes deep down would not have been chosen. If everyone’s worst nightmare is losing a star for the beginning of the stretch drive, the legitimate concern is emotional and physical wear and tear on their best players.
But this time the three teams in the tri-state area need to melt down some medals into adrenaline. Three wins in the Rangers’ last four games, leaving them only one point out of a playoff spot at the break, still make them only 6-17 since Jan. 9. The Devils have won five of their last 17 and the Islanders two of their last 11.
The NHL shuts down for two weeks every four years to raise the profile of its players. The league’s most populous market could use the Rangers’ Ryan Callahan and Chris Drury (U.S.A.), Henrik Lundqvist (Sweden), Marian Gaborik (Slovakia), and Olli Jokinen (Finland); the Devils’ Zach Parise and Jamie Langenbrunner (USA), Martin Brodeur (Canada), Patrik Elias (Czech Republic) and Ilya Kovalchuk (Russia); plus the Islanders’ Mark Streit (Switzerland) to get out of Vancouver with more than just good health.
Thanks to three overachieving months, the Devils maintain a 14-point cushion on a postseason berth. They have added Kovalchuk, a top five offensive talent in the NHL, at seemingly minimal cost, and will get their best defenseman, Paul Martin, back after the break. But they still need another defenseman to play deep into May and the question is whether general manager Lou Lamoriello has enough remaining trading chips to get it done.
The Islanders’ swoon, leaving them with five clubs to catch, has informed GM Garth Snow he should be a seller, no buyer, at the March 3 trade deadline. But an exceedingly young team has little to sell besides a message that a young talent base warrants an arena that can keep the team in New York.
Predictably, John Tavares, the dare-not-fail selection with the first overall pick last June, has hit the wall after a solid start, but two other recent No. 1 picks — Kyle Okposo and Josh Bailey — have inspired some patience in a patient approach, if not yet any trust that a 29th-ranked payroll will be expanded going forward.
Meanwhile, Rangers GM Glen Sather, having unloaded contract albatrosses like Scott Gomez and Ales Kotalik, has proved adept only at recovering from his own horrific mistakes. The Gomez trade cleared cap room for Gaborik, who has scored 35 goals, and a useful Jokinen was acquired last week for the useless Kotalik. But the team has spent almost to the cap without having a No. 1 center or No. 1 defenseman.
A squeak into the playoffs isn’t going to lubricate the rusted relationship between Sather and the fans, who are finding one playoff series win since his arrival in 2000 hard to swallow — just like the Wade Redden and Michal Rozsival contracts by Garden boss Jim Dolan. Those players need to be in Hartford and cap room cleared.
The Islanders haven’t won a round since 1993. The Devils were a difficult sellout even while winning three cups in nine years and have only two series victories in the last five playoffs.
The Devils’ last Cup year, 2003, was also the last time any of the three teams was in a conference final. That’s not going to make this Hockeytown.
