YOU know the old joke about the hockey team that’s only three players away from winning the Stanley Cup: Bobby Orr, Wayne Gretzky and Terry Sawchuk?
Well, this is no joke. The Rangers may very well be three players away from winning the East: Bobby Holik, Billy Guerin and Chris Chelios.
All three of whom are going to be available on July 1. All three of whom would love to come to Broadway.
We can tell you something else. The task of recruiting any one of the three is going to be far more difficult if the Rangers name Ken Hitchcock their head coach.
Glen Sather was typically combative at yesterday’s break-up day at Rye, volunteering next to nothing about his plan for Ron Low or anything else of substance. He angrily dismissed charges that he’s a puppeteer pulling the strings of his coach via the use of a walkie-talkie from the press box above and said that if any players on the team believed that to be the case: “Who cares what they think? They’ve missed the playoffs for five years. They need to change their thinking.”
The GM also said that he would not seek input from any of his current players regarding a new coach and dismissed suggestions that free agents might be influenced by whom he chooses.
If Sather truly believes that, he is mistaken. If he believes that Hitchcock is not to be an extremely hard sell, he’s mistaken about that, too. Regardless of his record in Dallas, word of mouth about Hitchcock, relentlessly negative, is not good. It is not good at all.
Mark Messier, who repeated yesterday that he had neither made a decision regarding playing next season nor had a timetable for doing so, said that he would not consider coaching next year.
There is Herb Brooks, but that seems unlikely. There are also potential candidates who won’t become available until their respective teams’ seasons end, including St. Louis’ Joel Quenneville and Ottawa’s Jacques Martin.
And then there’s another candidate still working, an assistant coach whom sources tell The Post is extremely well regarded by Sather, as well as by players around the league: Montreal’s Guy Carbonneau.
After an 18-year career during which he won three Cups and three Selke Awards, and two years as an assistant coach, Carbonneau may well be in line for a top spot. If he has interest, we have every reason to believe that Sather has interest in him.
There is much work to be done on Broadway. Brian Leetch has to be much better next season. Sather needs to keep Mike Richter, move Petr Nedved, and add a multitude of hard-edged players who will put an end to the chronic softness on Broadway. But with acute personnel moves, the Rangers really aren’t all that far away, not in a conference in which the Islanders jumped from 15th to fifth and the Bruins jumped from ninth to first.
They aren’t that far away, not if they get Holik, Guerin and Chelios. And not if they hire a coach who will make it easy to recruit that marquee hat trick of free agents.