Breaking down Presidents' Trophy plummets in search of a precedent for Rangers' predicament

The New York Rangers are in free fall, suffering through the kind of in-season implosion we rarely see from a contender.

The captain has been traded, the longest-serving star is on the block, the coach is on thin ice and the general manager is getting blasted from all sides.

Its a mess, to put it lightly.

Advertisement And its all coming after a 2023-24 season that saw the Rangers produce the best record in the league.

That led me to an idea: Which team put together the worst season immediately following a Presidents Trophy win? I could go through the history and find other teams that had similar falls, and highlight the ones that were good comparisons for this years Rangers.

Then I ran into a problem: Im not sure there are any.

With the obvious caveat that the season isnt over and theres plenty of time for the Rangers to turn this back around, whats happening in New York right now is verging on unprecedented.

Weve seen Presidents Trophy winners take a step back; thats almost to be expected.

Weve even seen a few miss the playoffs, although thats extremely rare.

But this level of full-fledged meltdown ? I dont know.

Lets do it anyway, if only to make Rangers fans feel like theyre not completely alone.

Ive picked out seven of the worst seasons by teams that had just won the Presidents Trophy.

That award dates to 1986, meaning we have nearly four decades to work with.

Surely we can find hope for our pals in New York, he said, not especially confidently.

1992-93 Rangers The Presidents Trophy season: The 1991-92 Rangers racked up 105 points under Roger Neilson, back in the pre-shootout and loser-point era, when breaking the century mark meant something.

That was Mark Messiers first year in New York, and he won MVP while teammate Brian Leetch took home the Norris Trophy and the goaltending duo of Mike Richter and John Vanbiesbrouck both finished in the top 10 in Vezina voting.

But then: The 1992-93 Rangers dropped to just 79 points, becoming the first Presidents Trophy winner to ever miss the playoffs.

How bad did it get? Neilson was fired in early January after a disastrous road tip that saw the team give up 20 goals in three losses.

He was replaced by AHL coach Ron Smith, who went just 15-22-7 the rest of the way in what would be his only head-coaching stint in the NHL .

Advertisement What went wrong? Plenty, but the big headline was a feud between Neilson and Messier.

The two butted heads over playing style, and it was widely perceived that Messier had been behind Neilsons firing .

In other words: Leadership ! Did they recover? You might say so.

I cant quite remember what happened to the 1993-94 Rangers , but there are probably some fans in New York who might, or I could just flip on the NHL Network at any random time and wait three minutes and Im sure theyd tell me all about it.

We said we wanted to offer some hope to Rangers fans, and our first entry turns out to do a pretty solid job.

Fair warning: Our next few entries will be a little less optimistic.

1993-94 Pittsburgh Penguins The Presidents Trophy season: The 1992-93 Penguins were the best team of the Mario Lemieux era, even though they didnt win the Cup.

That team had racked up an eye-popping 119 points, partly powered by a season-ending 17-game win streak.

Mario had returned from cancer to finish with 160 points in just 60 games, one of four 100-point forwards on the team.

They had a Hall of Famer in net, another on the blue line, three of historys top eight scorers up front and Scotty Bowman behind the bench.

They were unbeatable, right up until you-know-who did you-know-what .

But then: The 1993-94 edition dropped down to 101 points, then was knocked out in the first round.

How bad did it get? Not that bad, if were being honest, since 101 points was still enough to win the division.

But Bowman was gone, nobody cracked 100 points, and then the Penguins bowed out surprisingly easily to the Capitals .

What went wrong? Lemieux was hurt, playing just 22 games that year.

Thats more or less it.

Did they recover? Yes and no.

They were good for a few more years, making the playoffs every season until 2002.

But they wouldnt win the Cup again until the Sidney Crosby era, peaking with conference-final losses in 1996 and 2001.

We didnt know it at the time, but the glory years of the Mario era were already over.

1994-95 Rangers The Presidents Trophy season: Yes, the Rangers again, and we might be detecting a pattern.

This time, those 1993-94 Rangers, who ended the Stanley Cup drought, had also won the Presidents Trophy with 112 points.

But then: The lockout-shortened season saw the team drop under .500, finishing 22-23-3.

That was still good enough to make the playoffs, and they upset the Quebec Nordiques in the first round by cheating knowing how to win.

But they were swept in the second round.

Advertisement How bad did it get? They suffered through a seven-game losing streak in March and only made the playoffs by a single point over the second-year Florida Panthers .

What went wrong? Other than an ill-advised lockout sapping all the momentum out of the most marketable championship of the Bettman era? Messier is in the middle of this one again, as he went through a holdout that dragged into the season .

But the bigger issue was Mike Keenan, who coached the team to that 1994 championship and then almost immediately stabbed them in the back to go to St.

Louis , leaving Colin Campbell in charge.

Did they recover? They got back to 96 points in 1995-96 and went on a surprise run to the conference final in 1996-97, then missed the playoffs for the next seven seasons.

2007-08 Buffalo Sabres The Presidents Trophy season: Yep, were jumping ahead over a decade, thanks to a stretch in which all the Presidents Trophy winners held up, including five that either repeated or won the Cup the next season.

That brings us to the second year of the cap era, when the Sabres racked up 113 points before losing to Ottawa in the conference final.

But then: The encore season saw the Sabres drop all the way to 90 points, missing the playoffs.

They were barely even in the race, and wisely chose to sell at the deadline, moving all-star Brian Campbell to the San Jose Sharks .

How bad did it get? At one point they lost 10 games in a row under flummoxed head coach Lindy Ruff, which would surely never happen again.

What went wrong? Free agency.

The 2006-07 team had been led by Chris Drury and Danny Briere, but both stars left in the offseason for big UFA deals in New York and Philadelphia, respectively.

The Sabres also had to fight off an offer sheet to Thomas Vanek, further disrupting their cap situation.

It was an especially frustrating time for fans in Buffalo, whod been assured that the recent lockout and new CBA would allow them to compete on equal footing with the bigger-market teams, which were instead raiding their roster.

Advertisement Did they recover? Rangers fans, avert your eyes.

The Sabres did make it back to the playoffs in 2010 and 2011, but lost in the first round both times and havent been back since.

2012-13 Vancouver Canucks The Presidents Trophy seasons: After winning the Presidents Trophy in 2011 and coming up one win short of a championship, the Canucks went back-to-back with 111 points.

But then: In the lockout-shortened season, the Canucks dropped to a roughly 100-point pace, finishing well back of teams such as Chicago , Pittsburgh and Anaheim .

Then they got swept in the first round.

How bad did it get? Alain Vigneault was fired after the season and replaced with John Tortorella, which worked out great.

What went wrong? This was the year when the whole Roberto Luongo/Cory Schneider goaltending drama really came to a head, with Schneider taking over the starters job but then getting hurt right before the playoffs.

In a surprise move, he was then traded to New Jersey at the draft.

Did they recover? No.

This year basically spelled the end of the Canucks championship window, as theyd miss the playoffs under Tortorella and wouldnt win another round until the 2020 bubble.

2014-15 Boston Bruins The Presidents Trophy season: The 2013-14 Bruins had 117 points despite not having any players hit 70 points or top 30 goals.

Tuukka Rask won the Vezina, which helped.

But then: The 2014-15 team dropped to 96 points and missed the playoffs.

How bad did it get? After a decent first half, they lost six straight games in February, then did it again in March.

What went wrong? Its hard to say, as the core of the team didnt change much, aside from losing Jarome Iginla.

But a lot of issues added up, as Zdeno Chara and David Krejci both missed time with injuries, Patrice Bergeron was the only player to so much as hit the 50-point mark and Rask was merely good instead of Vezina-worthy.

Advertisement Did they recover? Not immediately, as theyd miss the playoffs in 2015-16, too.

But they eventually got back near the top of the league within a few years, and they did it without a major rebuild.

2022-23 Florida Panthers(?) The Presidents Trophy season: The 2021-22 Panthers challenged the all-time record with 58 wins on the way to a 122-point season.

But then: Youll note the question mark in the header there, because Im honestly not sure this team should even count.

But lets do it anyway: The 2022-23 Panthers suffered one of the worst single-season drops of the cap era, plunging 30 points down to just 92 under new coach Paul Maurice.

How bad did it get? A late-season losing streak led to Maurice having a full-blown meltdown behind the bench , and the Panthers needed a miracle win by the Hawks over the Penguins in the seasons final week to even get them into the playoffs.

What went wrong? Maurice was a bum, Sergei Bobrovsky was a sieve and the newly acquired Matthew Tkachuk was a me-first prima donna whod never lead a team to wins when it mattered.

Or so we thought, right up until the playoffs started.

Did they recover? Oh, Id say so.

Despite barely making the playoffs as the last wild card, the Panthers went all the way to the final that year.

The year after, they won the Stanley Cup.

Did that help, Rangers fans? I feel like it might have.

Of the seven worst Presidents Trophy flameouts in history, two won the Stanley Cup the year after their collapse, three were able to reclaim at least some degree of success, and only two never truly recovered.

Also, two of the teams were, uh, the Rangers.

So at the very least, you guys should be used to this by now.

(Top photo of Glenn Healey slipping on the ice in 1993: Rick Stewart / Allsport).

This article has been shared from the original article on theathleticuk, here is the link to the original article.