The New York Rangers; Broadway's Longest-Running Hit

Champaign, IL: Sagamore Publishing, 1996. Presumed First Edition, First printing. Hardcover. Very good/Good. Deborah M. Bellaire (Jacket Design).. vii, [1],360 pages. Illustrations. Sources. Appendices. Foreword by Neil Smith. Officially Licensed Product of the New York Rangers. DJ has some wear, soiling, edge tears and chips. John Kreiser is a sports reporter who spent more than 15 years with the Associated Press The New York Rangers are a professional ice hockey team based in New York City. They are members of the Metropolitan Division of the Eastern Conference of the National Hockey League (NHL). The team plays its home games at Madison Square Garden, located in the borough of Manhattan. The Rangers are one of three NHL franchises in the New York metropolitan area, along with the New Jersey Devils and New York Islanders. The club is also one of the oldest teams in the NHL, having joined in 1926 as an expansion franchise. They are part of the group of teams referred to as the Original Six, along with the Boston Bruins, Chicago Blackhawks, Detroit Red Wings, Montreal Canadiens and Toronto Maple Leafs. The Rangers were the first NHL franchise in the United States to win the Stanley Cup, which they have done four times, most recently in 1993-94. The 1993-94 season was a successful one for Rangers fans, as Mike Keenan led the Rangers to their first Stanley Cup championship in 54 years. Two years prior, they picked up center Mark Messier, a part of the Edmonton Oilers' Cup-winning teams. Other ex-Oilers on the Rangers included Adam Graves, Kevin Lowe, Jeff Beukeboom, Esa Tikkanen, Craig MacTavish and Glenn Anderson. Graves would set a team record with 52 goals, breaking the prior record of 50, held by Vic Hadfield. The Rangers clinched the Presidents' Trophy by finishing with the best record in the NHL at 52-24-8, setting a franchise record with 112 points earned. The Rangers successfully made it past the first two rounds of the playoffs, sweeping the New York Islanders, and then defeating the Washington Capitals in five games. However, in the Conference Finals against the third-seeded New Jersey Devils, the Rangers lost the series opener at home in double overtime, but won the next two games before the Devils defeated them 3-1 and 4-1. The series headed back to the Meadowlands for the sixth game, in which Messier scored three times in the final period to lead the Rangers to a 4-2 win and set up a seventh game back at Madison Square Garden. The Rangers won game seven 2-1, when Stéphane Matteau scored a goal in double overtime, leading the team to the Finals for the first time since 1979. Up against the Vancouver Canucks, the Rangers again lost the series opener at home in overtime. The Rangers bounced back and they won the next three games, allowing the Canucks just four goals. However, the Canucks won the next two 6-3 and 4-1 to set up a seventh game, for the second consecutive series, at home. In the seventh game, the Rangers took a 2-0 first period lead, with Messier scoring later to put the Rangers up 3-1, the eventual Cup winning goal as the home team won 3-2, becoming the first (and to this date, the only) player to captain two teams to the Stanley Cup. Brian Leetch became the first American-born player to win the Conn Smythe Trophy as playoff MVP, while Alexander Karpovtsev, Alexei Kovalev, Sergei Nemchinov and Sergei Zubov became the first Russians to have their names engraved on the Stanley Cup.