WASHINGTON — A year ago, we knew exactly who and what those guys were when the playoffs began. They were Black-and-Blueshirts and they were Bluebloods who for the most part had been nurtured within the organization and had coalesced to earn top seed in the East.
Now, though, as the first round of this year’s tournament opens here tonight against the Caps, there is an essential question about the Rangers, and it is the one that Butch and Sundance asked one another: “Who are those guys?”
The core was split, first over the summer in the trade for Rick Nash, and then again at the trade deadline with the trade of Marian Gaborik. Fourteen players made their Rangers’ debuts this season, albeit some in cameo roles. Seven guys expected to play tonight did not participate in last year’s trip to the conference finals.
There is no real identity to this group though the core principles have survived the loss of core principals. There was no training camp in which to develop a mindset. These guys just haven’t been together that long.
Except this team did find its stride down the stretch in going 10-3-1, and 9-3-1 after the moves around the April 3 deadline. And except that as Brad Richards tells it, that’s when the team truly became a team for the first time this lockout season.
“I think we’ve become a lot more sure of ourselves as a unit since the deadline,” Richards told The Post following yesterday’s short practice at home that preceded the flight to D.C. “There were a lot of ifs and buts and wondering; a lot of changes early.
“But it calmed down after the deadline. Things have been a lot more stable the last few weeks.”
If John Tortorella has alluded to it once, the coach has alluded to it 100 times. The moves in which the Rangers added Ryane Clowe, Derick Brassard, John Moore and a few days before that, Mats Zuccarello, solidified the lineup.
The additions gave the coach more options he trusted while allowing him to subtract J.T. Miller and Chris Kreider as well as, of course, Gaborik, who had become a ceaseless topic of conversation.
Moves were made and tension was lifted. There still were questions, specifically after the defeats in Philadelphia and Florida, but they were different questions. There was different talk.
Trading Gaborik changed the subject. And so did defeating the Penguins 6-1 in the first game after the deadline when Clowe joined the lineup without sleep after taking a red-eye from California and when Brassard and Moore arrived at the Garden within 15 minutes of the opening faceoff.
“It was just, ‘Go play,’ ” said Richards. “We played and we had fun and we all realized that we had a good team.
“It took a lot of pressure off us mentally. It refreshed everybody.”
The core was split, but Henrik Lundqvist remains, and so do Black-and-Blueshirt lettermen Dan Girardi and Ryan McDonagh (and perhaps at some point, Marc Staal), and Ryan Callahan, Derek Stepan, Carl Hagelin and Michael Del Zotto, who went through it all a year ago, all the way to Game 6 of the conference finals.
“I think we learned a lot of lessons,” said Richards, the lone Ranger to have won a Stanley Cup. “We learned about closing out games and closing out series; about how games are won on big plays at the right time.
“I think the history of hockey shows that young teams grow a lot from one year to the next after going through the kind of experience we had last year.”
Last year, we knew who they were. Now, we’re not quite sure. Richards, though, has no doubts.
“I’ll give you the clichés about preparing for Game 1, focusing on one game at a time and taking it one series at a time, because they’re all true,” said Big Moment Brad. “But with the goaltending we have and the people we have, I go into this thinking we have a legitimate chance to win the Stanley Cup.
“I like our chances as much as anybody.”