LOS ANGELES — It is the direst of circumstances for the Rangers, but it’s one that has to be addressed.
For Game 1 of the Stanley Cup final against the Kings on Wednesday night at the Staples Center, the man backing up starting goalie Henrik Lundqvist was less than a no-name.
David LeNeveu sat there on the bench at the start of the game presumably star-struck, because that is certainly what he was during Tuesday’s media day.
“Coming into this year,” LeNeveu had said, “I was just worried about getting a job.”
Regular backup Cam Talbot had not practiced in four days, and coach Alain Vigneault continued to call him “day-to-day.” When asked if he could explain how Talbot sustained the injury, Vigneault answered with a terse, “No.”
And so it was LeNeveu who dressed, a goalie who had not played a game for the Rangers this season and actually had not played a game in the NHL since April 3, 2011.
“Every kid dreams of this opportunity,” LeNeveu said. “So here we are and hopefully we’ll take advantage of it.”
LeNeveu, 30, was signed by the Rangers on Jan. 21, his second stint with the club, and played admirably for AHL Hartford, putting up a 12-8 record to go with a 2.46 goals-against average and a .915 save percentage. That included a stretch of 9-1-1 to finish off the season, drawing the praise of Rangers goaltending coach Benoit Allaire.
“I know from what Benny told me, he finished the season off in Hartford,” Vigneault said. “He’s an experienced guy that has been practicing with our team here throughout the playoffs, with our guys from Hartford. He’s a good goaltender.”
LeNeveu came out of Cornell as a second-round draft pick by the Coyotes in 2002. He played just 21 games for the club over a five-year stretch, and was eventually acquired by the Rangers in a trade on Feb. 26, 2008, part of the deal that sent Al Montoya and Marcel Hossa to Phoenix in exchange for LeNeveu, Josh Gratton and Fredrik Sjostrom.
He played just 13 games for Hartford in the 2007-08 season, and within two years, he was playing for a Salzburg EC in Austria.
LeNeveu managed to get a deal with the Blue Jackets in 2010-11, playing just one game for the NHL club, and then went back to Austria to play the 2012-13 season with Linz ECH.
At the beginning of this season, the best he could get was a deal with the South Carolina Stingrays team in the East Coast league — lower than the AHL — and that led into a professional tryout with the Providence Bruins, an affiliate of the Boston Bruins.
He got one start for Providence, stopping 26-of-28 shots in a 4-2 win over Adirondack, and on Jan. 13, was released from the tryout.
Eight days later the Rangers signed him and sent to him back to Hartford.
“It’s been a wild year,” LeNeveu said. “That’s for sure.”
Talbot, meanwhile, had been a stabilizing force for the Rangers. He first joined the club early in the season after veteran backup Martin Biron was put on waivers and eventually retired. Talbot then spelled Lundqvist during his struggles in October and November — even starting three straight games over a healthy Lundqvist that bridged the Christmas break.
Talbot had seen action in two postseason games, coming in after Vigneault pulled Lundqvist in two tough performances — Game 6 of the first round against the Flyers, and Game 5 in the Eastern Conference final against the Canadiens.
But at some point, Talbot tweaked an already existing injury, the one bit of information Vigneault has been willing to disclose.
And now, after all that, it left a guy named LeNeveu as the backup for Lundqvist in the Stanley Cup finals.
It was a scenario that hardly seemed real.
“It’d be a huge opportunity just to be there to support the guys,” LeNeveu said, “and do whatever I need to do to help the team win.”