The dirty laundry was not about to be publicly aired Wednesday afternoon when Rangers general manager Glen Sather announced the firing of coach John Tortorella.
“It wasn’t one thing, and I’m not going to speculate or start to criticize what happened with Torts and give you a lot of reasons why we decided to do this,” Sather said on a conference call. “After the analytical work we do every year at the end of season trying to decide how we’re going to improve the team and how we’re going to move forward, this is a decision we made, a decision that was consulted with some people so that everyone knew what was going to happen.”
Sather did say that Tortorella was shocked to hear the news, but that he took it like a gentleman. The decision is believed to be unrelated to the team’s 2012-13 regular-season record and second-round playoff elimination, but rather to the core belief by management that the club’s players had grown weary of Tortorella’s overbearing personality.
“Removing anybody from the coaching role of the New York Rangers is a difficult decision,” Sather said, “but I think I made the right decision so that we can go forward in another direction.”
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One year after making it to the conference finals, the Rangers lost this season a round earlier, falling in five games to the Bruins in the Eastern Conference semifinals. There seemed to be conflicting sentiments about the season coming from Tortorella and from his locker room, specifically franchise goaltender Henrik Lundqvist.
During Monday’s break-up day, Lundqvist called the season “a step back.” Minutes later, Tortorella vehemently disagreed, calling it instead, “a sideways step.”
“What Henirk was talking about was last year we got into the conference finals, this year we didn’t make that,” Sather said. “I think that’s what he was referring to. As far as I’m concerned, if you’re not in the Stanley Cup [finals] and you’re not there winning it, your season has not been a success. The ultimate goal is to win the Stanley Cup here, so anytime that we don’t get there, I don’t think we’ve achieved our goal.”
Lundqvist is going to be a free agent after this coming season, and it seems as if the team doesn’t wrap him up with a long-term deal before training camp starts, then he might have one foot out the door. To say that Sather had to choose between Lundqvist and Tortorella is nothing more than wild speculation, yet the GM said his plan is for the reigning Vezina Trophy winner to stay in New York for good.
“We plan on signing Henrik to a long-term contract,” Sather said. “I’m not going to make any public comments on the negotiations, how and when they’re going to take place. But it had nothing to do with this. This was a decision that I made.”
A decision that Sather also said he had a hand in was scratching former Conn Smythe winner Brad Richards for the final two games of the Bruins series. Richards, 33, is due $6.67 million per year until 2019-20, and because of the precipitous decline in his game has become a prime candidate for the Rangers’ final amnesty buyout. Sather can use that either this summer or next to send Richards packing and wipe his cap hit off their books.
“That’s a decision we’re going to make later at our organizational meetings [in late June],” Sather said about Richards. “At this time, I’m not thinking about that. I’m trying to deal with this situation and move forward.”
As for moving forward, Sather continued to be evasive about the type of coach he would like to hire. Yet he did point out there are similarities between the teams still alive fighting for the Stanley Cup – the Penguins and Bruins in the East finals, and the Kings set to take on the winner of Wednesday night’s Game 7 between the Blackhawks and Red Wings.
“If you look at the teams that are going to be contending for the Stanley Cup, there are specific ingredients that every team has and some teams don’t have,” Sather said. “I’d like to take the best of what those teams have and integrate them into our team.”
The most logical choices out there for possible replacements start with Lindy Ruff, the longtime coach of the Sabres who was fired early in the year. After him comes former Canucks headman Alain Vigneault, and then possibly Dave Tippett, whose contract with the Coyotes expires on June 30.
“There are a lot of factors when you go looking for someone to develop and help your team get us to your ultimate goal,” Sather said. “And as you know it’s not an easy thing to achieve, but we have to keep striving to get there.”
The striving continues, but now it goes on without Tortorella.
bcyrgalis@nypost.com