For upon |The energy in the Rangers locker room since the Feb. 26 trade deadline passed is vastly different than at any time in the previous five years. There is a youthful enthusiasm and a minimal amount of stoic seriousness that defined the veteran group continually vying for a Stanley Cup.
But that change in personality is not always the easiest thing to handle for those who had been around for those good times.
“It’s been difficult to see everyone go, a lot of my good friends, in a year and a half, they’re gone,” Marc Staal told The Post on Saturday night in St. Louis. “So it hasn’t been easy in that way on a personal level. But as far as hockey goes, I think the deadline passed and the focus got back on playing hockey games, and it’s been kind of nice.
“There was such a lead-up, and it felt like forever. When it did pass, it was nice to just go play a game again. Made us a little bit more free, I guess you could say.”
That is reflected in the Rangers’ 5-2-2 record since the deadline, and the change in attitude is reflected in the way they reacted to a 4-3 overtime loss to the Blues. In years past, it would have been the reason for long faces and glum responses. This young group certainly wasn’t happy with its dead-flat start — even drawing some sarcastic humor out of buttoned-up coach Alain Vigneault — but the players were proud of their comeback, and they didn’t find a need to be too broken up about the loss.
“Obviously [management’s] goal is to rebuild, and when you have a deadline like that and what happens, you don’t know how it’s going to affect your team,” said Staal, whose team resumes practice Monday before Tuesday night’s Garden match against the Blue Jackets.
“But when you have a lot of young guys come in your lineup, trying to make a name for themselves, trying to show they can stay here, you’re going to be in games, you’re going to be competitive. And that’s what we’ve been doing — sticking around, playing as best we can, and working hard. In this league, that’s going to give you a chance.”
Staal remains just one of four players on the roster from John Tortorella’s 2012 Eastern Conference final team, along with Henrik Lundqvist, Mats Zuccarello, and Chris Kreider. The turnover has been immense, never more so than when general manager Jeff Gorton jettisoned Ryan McDonagh, Rick Nash, J.T. Miller, and Michael Grabner just before last month’s deadline for assets focused on the future.
More change is likely to come this summer, but it’s hard to see any scenario in which the 31-year-old Staal isn’t vying for a top-six spot in September’s training camp, with three more years remaining on a contract that carries an annual salary-cap hit of $5.7 million.
“It was an odd situation to have gone through, to be honest, but I’m still here, I’m still part of this team, I still want to go out and compete and do what they expect me to do,” Staal said. “That’s how I’ve tried to handle the last few months. We’ve had a lot of young guys come in, playing really well, just trying to do my job on the ice, support them.”
Staal has mostly been a dependable bedrock on the left side for rookie Neal Pionk, who has come into his own while riding an assist streak of four games, putting up six assists total. Staal has embraced that role as a mentor and wants to continue to help out.
“We’ve had a lot of veteran guys in here for a long time, so now we have a lot of youth, and it’s fun seeing their excitement, their energy, to come to the rink every day,” Staal said. “So that part of it has been refreshing, especially after everything that happened.”
It’s been a whirlwind for Staal and for the Rangers organization as a whole. The entire tenor of the organization has changed, and the lightness in the locker room has come in like a breath of fresh air — and brought with it some moments of the Rangers playing decent hockey again.
“Whatever our record is since the deadline, it’s been nice coming to the rink knowing we can win some games, I have to tell you,” Staal said. “Nothing to do about it now. We’ll see what happens at the end of the season, and we’ll go from there.”
The article was originally published here.
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