MONTREAL — There will be a time when everything will sink in completely for Martin St. Louis. That time might not come until well into next month when these Stanley Cup playoffs are complete, but it will surely come.
And when it does, there likely will be tears of sadness for the sudden and unexpected loss of his mother, France, to a heart attack on May 8. If everything works out the way St. Louis and his Rangers teammates hope, there, too, might be tears of joy — for bringing the Stanley Cup to Madison Square Garden for the first time since 1994.
Even after Monday night’s gritty 3-1 Rangers victory over a desperate Canadiens team in Game 2 of the Eastern Conference final at the Bell Centre, there remains work to be done before that task is complete. Six more victories worth of work.
If those six wins come to the Rangers, St. Louis, acquired on March 5 in a trade with Tampa Bay, will have been a significant part of the memorable run. And he will have made his most critical contributions while playing with a heavy heart, carrying on for his teammates despite his mother’s death.
If the Stanley Cup returns to New York for the first time in 20 years, France St. Louis, too, will have had a deeply emotional impact on the Rangers’ run. She already has. Monday night was the Rangers’ fifth consecutive win since her passing, which came with the Rangers trailing the Penguins three games to one in the previous series.
St. Louis, who scored the first goal of this series on Saturday afternoon, staking the Rangers to a crucial 1-0 lead in a Game 1 win that ended in a 7-2 victory, scored another huge goal Monday — this one giving the Rangers a 3-1 lead at 8:03 of the second period.
It was his second goal of the series and fifth of the playoffs. And it came one day after St. Louis said a final goodbye to his mother in a stirring ceremony that took place in nearby Laval, Quebec, about 20 minutes north of the Bell Centre.
The entire Rangers team attended the funeral — something that greatly moved St. Louis, who delivered a moving eulogy.
“It was a great comfort,’’ St. Louis said before Monday’s game. “They’ve been awesome. For us, it was a little closure, I guess, and I was glad that the team was a part of it.’’
It has been difficult to tell exactly how badly St. Louis has been hurting inside since his mother’s death because he has been playing so well and handling himself with such remarkable grace.
It has been quite a week for St. Louis. He flew to Montreal earlier than the rest of the team so he could attend the wake on Friday. On Saturday, he gave the Rangers that 1-0 lead. Then came the funeral Sunday, followed by Game 2 on Monday night and another goal.
The way St. Louis has compartmentalized his grief while still performing at such a high level for the team has been an inspiration to his teammates, leaving them to marvel at his poise.
After Monday night’s win, St. Louis praised his teammates for weathering the storm the desperate Canadiens brought, saying, “It was a great job to come in here and not be satisfied with a split.
“We had a big opportunity and they came out strong,” he said. “It’s a big one for our team.’’