The 6-foot-4, 220-pound elephant in the big room all but obscured the significance of the Rangers’ 3-2 overtime victory last night over the 30th-overall Blue Jackets at the Garden.
That’s because the immediate fate of Rick Nash, the Columbus power winger who has been made available to the Blueshirts among a select number of NHL clubs in advance of next Monday’s trade deadline will have more impact on the Rangers this season and in years to come than the two points they earned last night.
Nash, who scored the tying goal with 1:33 remaining in the third after which fans chanted “We Don’t Want You” before Derek Stepan struck for the OT winner at 0:22, offered a rational response to the fans’ collective thumbs-down.
“It’s the kind of reaction you would expect in any building after scoring the tying goal,” he said.
Nash shed little light on whether he might be Broadway bound, offering variations of “no comment” to three different questions before the game regarding a possible move. Nash then swatted away a postgame question about whether he considered last night’s match a showcase.
Blue Jackets general manager Scott Howson has turned Nash’s limited availability into a traveling circus. It has become impossible to determine whether teams are seriously pursuing Nash or whether Howson is attempting to create a big-market market for the left winger, who has been the small market’s franchise player since his first-overall selection in the 2002 Entry Draft.
Howson was in Philadelphia on Saturday to meet with Flyers senior management. Yesterday morning, Howson met at his Manhattan hotel with Toronto GM Brian Burke. Los Angeles, Boston and Vancouver have been solicited for offers.
Rangers GM Glen Sather, who is believed to have chatted last night with Howson, seems unfazed over the cap crunch he would create in the future by picking up the remainder of the Nash’s contract, under which No. 61 will carry an annual $7.8 million charge through 2017-18.
Sather apparently believes Nash, who has scored between 27 and 41 goals for seven straight seasons, would fortify the Rangers, who have come from modest beginnings to first place in the East by nine points over the Bruins and Devils.
Rather, Sather is fazed by Columbus’ asking price, believed to be Brandon Dubinsky, Ryan McDonagh or Michael Del Zotto, Boston College winger Chris Kreider and either a first-round pick or another of the Rangers’ top prospects.
McDonagh and Del Zotto are untouchables on the NHL roster, and Kreider is regarded as a can’t-miss prospect with a ceiling as high as those in an apartment in a Manhattan pre-war building.
It is unknown whether Sather has made a counter-proposal.
The Rangers persevered to gain the victory when the club’s attack-oriented OT mentality produced a picture goal created by a Marian Gaborik’s speed and Del Zotto’s brilliant backhand, back-door relay to Stepan at the left porch.
Nash, whose right circle knuckler eluded Henrik Lundqvist to tie the match, has skated under the radar throughout his career. But the Columbus captain has been on the world stage, a point he reinforced when asked for his reaction to being interrogated by a dozen reporters before the match.
“I’ve played in the Olympics a couple of times for Canada,” he said. “This is nothing compared to that.”
And now there is no more than a week to go until it’s known whether the elephant in the big room on Broadway will call it home.
And whether the fans will be chanting Nash’s name in celebration the next time he scores here.