It seems counterintuitive that a team that won the Presidents Trophy with 114 points last season would have numerous key pieces of their lineup that underperformed their career norms.
The New York Rangers, though, thrived despite just that happening, racking up 55 victories and moving to within two wins of the Stanley Cup Final. For the Blueshirts to get those two victories, and the four more required to capture the Stanley Cup, they’ll need at least a few of those players to rebound and rediscover their pre-2023-24 form.
The Rangers will certainly require growth from some of their younger guys to take the next step. Their chances of reaching the top of the championship mountain, however, still hinge mostly on the core veterans carrying them there.
The good news for the Blueshirts is that those players are still in their prime, and resurgent seasons for the Rangers’ stars are certainly possible and perhaps even likely. So without further ado, here’s a look at five key players that must perform better in 2024-25 for the club to take the next step toward hoisting the chalice:
Mika Zibanejad
Calling a 72-point season a “disappointment” seems like a stretch, but the Rangers’ ostensible No. 1 center simply didn’t play up to the lofty standards he achieved from 2019-23, a four-season span in which he averaged better than a point per game and racked up 172 points in the two seasons preceding 2023-24. Making matters worse, 12 of Mika Zibanejad‘s 26 goals last season came on the power play, along with 19 of his 46 assists. While he certainly played a key role on the Blueshirts’ lethal first unit with the man advantage, the Rangers need him to produce much more consistently at 5 on 5.
Again, the 31-year-old wasn’t bad last season, but he’ll have to get back to the dynamic offensive ways that cemented him as a clear No. 1 pivot if the Rangers are to go deep in the playoffs. Even-strength scoring, an Achilles heel of this club, seems unlikely to improve significantly if Zibanejad doesn’t find a way to deliver more than 14 goals at 5-on-5.
Adam Fox
This one gets a big asterisk because the 2021 Norris Trophy winner suffered an injury that forced him to miss 10 games earlier in the season, and may have robbed Adam Fox of some of his jump and sneaky mobility after returning. The fact is, though, that despite posting 73 points in 72 games, the 26-year-old looked at least somewhat worn down at the end of the regular season for the second straight year. Fox’s 5-foot-11, 182-pound frame has hardly hindered him on his road to becoming one of the elite defensemen in the NHL, but it’s possible that the rigors of an 82-game season and a workload that consistently hovers around 23-24 minutes per game may be an issue for a smaller player – one that the Rangers will have to think about at some point.
The club has to be hoping that the offseason has allowed Fox, who suffered another lower-body injury against the Washington Capitals in the first round of the playoffs, to recuperate and rediscover his form. They’ll have little chance to win the Cup without him at his best.
Jacob Trouba
It’s become clear after five seasons that Jacob Trouba isn’t the top-pair, shutdown defenseman the Rangers thought they were getting or what they paid for after acquiring him in June 2019. They also never expected him to end up on the third pair, but that’s precisely what happened late last season, and chances are that the captain will find himself there from the get-go this time. With rising youngster Braden Schneider in line for more responsibility in 2024-25 after leapfrogging Trouba last season, it appears the Blueshirts will be employing a bottom-pair defender who carries an $8 million salary-cap hit for the next two seasons.
Trouba, who’s just 30, appears to have shrugged off attempts by the front office to rid themselves of his onerous contract in June. Regardless, it was the clear decline in his game last season that fans should be worried about. Trouba also struggled with injury in 2023-24, but his lack of mobility is becoming more noticeable and he may be on the verge of becoming a clear liability whose time in the Big Apple is limited. Trouba has yet to reach the 50 mark in expected goal share in his five seasons in a Rangers sweater.
If does indeed find himself stapled to the third pair, can he at least dominate those matchups, presuming he’s healthy? Largely shielded from first-pair minutes during his time with the Winnipeg Jets, Trouba recorded four straight seasons of an expected goal share of 50 or above. The Rangers would like to believe he’s at least going to be capable of coming out on top against bottom-six forwards, thus stabilizing the last pair on defense.
If he can’t, the Blueshirts will find themselves lacking in depth, physicality and experience on the back line, which could cascade through the defense corps. It might force coach Peter Laviolette to swap in veteran Chad Ruhwedel for Trouba and lead to a situation in which Laviolette has little trust in his bottom defense pair, perhaps subsequently wearing down his top two duos by relying on them more heavily than he’d like.
Trouba’s days in New York are likely drawing to a close, but for a team with Stanley Cup aspirations, the Rangers are desperate for a bounce-back effort from the Michigan native.
K’Andre Miller
K’Andre Miller’s uncommon physical gifts remain intact, and the Rangers still salivate at his potential to develop into a do-it-all, first-pair defenseman who can skate, score, outmuscle opponents and dominate in his own end. Yet there’s no denying that the 22nd overall pick in the 2018 NHL Draft took a step backward last season, finishing with 30 points – 13 fewer than in 2022-23 – and posting some troubling underlying numbers that painted an unmistakable picture of at least a hiccup in his development.
Miller dealt with some mental health issues last season, so the club is hoping that having put those behind him, they’ll see him go back to trending upward, as he did during his first three NHL seasons. There are still some question marks, though, as the front office is looking for him to become more physical, and there may be at least a smidgen of doubt as to when – or if – Miller can fully meld his athleticism with technique and grow into the player the team traded up four spots in the first round to acquire.
The Rangers envision Miller as one of the anchors of a mobile, tough, versatile defense in the near future. They’d like to see him go back to moving in that direction again this season.
Ryan Lindgren
The Rangers have unquestionably benefited from Ryan Lindgren’s all-out style, the undersized defenseman providing physicality and edge for a team that always needs it, with the Minnesota native also providing spark and inspiration with his ability to quickly overcome hits and injuries that would seemingly put other players out for weeks at a time.
Yet pain appears to just find Lindgren, and the organizational concerns that the 26-year-old can only take so much of a pounding before he starts to decline were anything but allayed last season. Though he played 76 games, 13 more than in 2022-23, Fox’s regular defense partner saw his expected goal share plummet from 53.4 the previous season to 45.0 – the lowest mark of his four NHL seasons in which he played at least 51 games. The career path of Dan Girardi has to be on the minds of team executives as they ponder whether to commit long-term to Lindgren, who’s playing under a one-year, $4.5 million deal after the sides agreed to avoid arbitration.
Related: Rangers’ Projected 2024-25 Roster Is an Improvement Over Last Season’s
It seems pretty clear that Lindgren will have to turn in a reasonably healthy and effective season for a multi-year contract to happen with the Blueshirts. The Rangers will surely be rooting for it, given his chemistry with Fox and the grit and edge he brings to the defense – at least for one more season.
Bounceback Candidates Give Rangers Room to Grow
It’s more than fair to question whether this Rangers roster is like so many in the franchise’s recent and distant past – good enough to make a run at a championship, but just not good enough to go all the way – but the fact that the five key players listed above had varying degrees of down seasons shouldn’t be overlooked when considering the 2024-25 team’s Stanley Cup prospects. If Zibanejad and Fox play like the 2022-23 versions of themselves, if Trouba goes back to banging bodies and driving opponents to distraction, if Miller takes the next step toward elite status and if Lindgren turns in a stout throwback effort as the yin to Fox’s yang again, the Rangers could be a more capable team when it comes playoff time.
Of course, regression by others could negate any such gains, and it’s naive to think that won’t happen to at least some degree. However, several rebound performances could give the Rangers a real chance to be an even better team than they were last season – if not in regular-season record, then perhaps in viability as a contender to lift the Cup.
