When you think of rivalries that have been great in recent memory, the Islanders-Rangers clash isn’t one that readily comes to mind. For basically the decade since the 2005 lock-out, the Rangers have been a reasonably good team (and rising, as their Eastern Conference championship and Stanley Cup Final appearance last season shows) but the Islanders have been, frankly, a joke.
The franchise headquartered on Long Island had become a laughing stock, and a perfect blueprint of how not to run a team. In some ways, they were the Edmonton Oilers of the east, a team with plenty of young talent on their roster, spearheaded by the likes of John Tavares and Ryan Strome, but somehow unable to form them into the nucleus of a winning team. Their GM has made some questionable moves, and owner Charles Wang is notorious amongst Islander fans for not really caring about the performance of his tea.
All of that changed this year, with Wang selling a large minority interest in the team, one that will later transition to full ownership. Some key acquisitions followed, including former Stanley Cup-winning Boston Bruins defenceman Johnny Boychuk, marking huge changes to the way the boys from the Nassau County Coliseum – or Mausoleum, as Rangers fans love to call it – play their hockey. The Isles made the playoffs two seasons ago, regressed last year, but have bounced back with a vengeance this season, leading the hotly-contested Metropolitan Division and sit second in the Eastern Conference at 37-18-1.
It pains me, as a Rangers fan to say it, but, really, it has to be said: the Isles are playing some damn good hockey. Tavares leads the team with 26 goals and 55 points, Strome is a sensational +14, Kyle Okposo had 30 assists, the hulking Boychuk added some much needed veteran presence on the blue line and Jaroslav Halak has been pretty good in goal, too. It’s a solid, winning team.
The Rangers aren’t going too badly, either, despite a long-term injury to star goaltender Henrik Lundqvist. Rick Nash is having an incredible season after an abnormally quite one previous. Now, he’s scoring seemingly at will, and has passed the 30-goal barrier. Chris Kreider seems like he’s ready to throw this team on his shoulders and propel them forward, and rookie signing Kevin Hayes is showing that Johnny Gaudreau isn’t the only guy recently out of Boston College who’s got some scoring touch.
How good is it to see both the Rangers and Isles at or near the top? Even though I loved those years where the Rangers beat the Isles seemingly at will, there’s nothing better in hockey – perhaps aside from a Game 7 overtime situation! – than watching a fiercely-contested rivalry. After years of this series being lopsided, to the point where cheers for the Rangers at Islanders home games were louder than those produced by the few Isles fans in attendance. The Coliseum might as well have been Madison Square Garden.
Yesterday’s belter of a contest, a 6-5 Rangers win, wasn't technically great hockey, but it sure as hell was exciting. There were mistakes, there was poor rebound control, there was a frantic looseness to the play that scares defensive coaches, and neither goalie had what you could call a banner day.
It didn’t matter, because, dammit, the game itself was epic nonetheless. It was back and forth, featured momentum swings like they were going out of fashion and, importantly for this Rangers fan, featured a furious comeback, spurred by two goals from star defenceman Ryan McDonagh, and a win, the first for the Rangers against the Islanders this year. Man, it was a long time coming.
Maybe it was better for my heart to see easy wins over the Islanders, but yesterday showed us just how great this rivalry can be when both teams are going well. The Rangers-Isles series is unique in sport, in that the two New York teams in baseball and football play one another sparingly. Not so in hockey, where there are regular games every season between the two New York clubs. That’s plenty of time to foster some enmity.
A quick check of my Twitter feed post-game saw many plaudits for the Rangers’ ability to come back – their first lead of the game was late in the last period – and many people wishing, hoping and even praying that these two teams somehow meet each other in a playoff series. Can you imagine seven games of the same stuff as we saw yesterday? It would be unimaginably awesome, the stuff that playoff dreams are made of.
Even if these rivals don’t meet in the playoffs, you get the feeling that neither team is going to lose their current competitiveness anytime soon, so we’re going to see them going hammer and tong at each other for many years to come.
Who knows? Maybe we’re entering another golden age for the Rangers-Islanders rivalry, as the Isles make the move, next season, to Brooklyn. The game, which is so strongly built on these big rivalries, would surely be better for it.
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