NEW YORK _ When the Rangers look back after this season ends, they may point to Wednesday as the day that the wheels came off.
In a 6-1 loss to the Boston Bruins _ who are a red-hot, legit Cup contender _ the Blueshirts lost their fourth straight and looked like a distracted team just waiting for trades, with their minds on their uncertain futures.
A discouraged Henrik Lundqvist, who has appeared in 46 games and was pulled after the Bruins scored four times on 16 shots, will still be around in April, long past the Feb. 26 trade deadline. But otherwise, this year's team is officially a squad in transition, often lost on defense, and one that is expected to shed some unrestricted free agents and perhaps some more familiar faces in the summer as a re-tooling continues.
The Rangers (25-24-5) seem destined to miss the postseason for the first time since the spring of 2010. Given the state of the Knicks, it also could be the first time since the spring of 2005 that no Madison Square Garden teams will host postseason games on Seventh Avenue. The Knicks made the playoffs in 2003-04, but lost in the first round to the New Jersey Nets. The Rangers didn't qualify, extending their playoff-less string to seven campaigns. In 2004-05, the NHL season was wiped out by a lockout and the Knicks fell short.
On Wednesday, the battered Rangers _ with five regulars sidelined _ were embarrassed by the Bruins, who have dramatically moved in the opposite direction.
A year ago, Bruce Cassidy took over as coach and guided them to the playoffs, where they fell to the Ottawa Senators in six games. The Rangers suffered the same fate at the hands of the Senators in the next round.
But in the regular season under Cassidy leading into Wednesday, the Bruins were third in wins (50), seventh in goals (255), second on the power play (24.0 percent), and second on the penalty-kill (83.5). At 33-11-8, the Bruins are just a point behind the Eastern Conference-leading Tampa Bay Lightning, with a game in hand. They have won 18 of their last 23 games.
Patrice Bergeron scored twice, Zdeno Chara had a goal and assist and youngsters such as Sean Kuraly, with a goal, David Pastrnak and Danton Heinen stepped up as well.
Rick Nash, one of those UFAs who could be packing his bags, scored his 16th at the five-minute mark, stealing the puck from Chara, steaming down the right side and beating Anton Khudobin with a low stickside wrister. Nothing thereafter went right for the Blueshirts.
After Brendan Smith was stripped of the puck and Lundqvist stopped David Backes, Tony DeAngelo lost track of Riley Nash in front, and it was 1-1 just 2:54 later. Steven Kampfer's giveaway led to Chara's point shot while Lundqvist was screened at 16:09. Bergeron scored the first of his pair at 3:47 of the second to make it 3-1, Tim Schaller went through DeAngelo and scored to chase Lundqvist, and then Bergeron went around Ryan McDonagh for a short-hander at the 10-minute mark with Ondrej Pavelec in the net.
Nash, who was asked to submit a list of teams to whom he would agree to be traded, speedster Michael Grabner, the winger who leads the team with 21 goals and defenseman Nick Holden _ probably won't be on the ice when the Rangers start a Western Canada road trip the day following the trade deadline. And speculation surrounds Mats Zuccarello and McDonagh, who may be swapped, like Derek Stepan was last summer, around the annual draft.
