The booing, after each of the four Senators goals and whenever else the Rangers play warranted it, said it all.
So did the cheers — the mock ones unleashed in the Garden when the public address announcer issued the one-minute remaining warning in the first period.
In a season filled with low after low that ultimately led to the cellar of the Eastern Conference, this frame was just the latest.
The Rangers were outshot, 14-6, by the Senators in the opening 20 minutes.
They didn’t have a scoring chance, according to Natural Stat Trick, let alone anything that qualified as a high-danger one.
Only three of those came from a top-nine forward, and all were collected by Mika Zibanejad.
Their ninth loss in the past 11 games was all but sealed by the time the horn sounded for the first time, and it only worsened across the final 40 minutes of their 8-4 loss, when Jonathan Quick was pulled for the second time in three games and the first two-goal game of Gabe Perreault’s young career emerged as perhaps the lone Rangers positive.
Each of the layers and wrinkles in the opening 20 minutes captured just how far the Rangers have fallen.
Alexis Lafrenière went from demoted out of the top-six Monday to the first line at the start Wednesday to a completely different combination 10 minutes later.
Quick only could do so much when many Senators sequences resembled five-on-Quick chances.
Vincent Trocheck was called for a holding penalty in the offensive zone 93 seconds into the game, and Drake Batherson opened the scoring for Ottawa less than a minute later.
Minutes later, Nick Jensen added to the Senators lead when his shot from the point deflected off Braden Schneider’s skate and past Quick.
Brady Tkachuk ripped a shot off the post and in off a 2-on-1. With 5.7 seconds remaining in the first, Dylan Cozens stepped into a shot from the slot to cap the disastrous frame.
The Senators were on the second night of a back-to-back, and yet it took until the middle of the second period for the Rangers to register their 10th shot on goal.
There were more “Fire Drury” chants. Quick was replaced by Spencer Martin after allowing Jake Sanderson and Thomas Chabot to score early in the second, and the Rangers allowed at least five goals for the third time in four games.
In every way, the loss that dropped their home record to 5-13-4 this year turned into an embarrassment, even with a three-goal third period.
This is what the Rangers put together — again — with less than two months until the trade deadline. Perreault did score twice, including once off a 2-on-1 rush with Zibanejad while falling across the crease.
The Rangers did generate more chances in the third period.
Spencer Martin only allowed one goal after taking over, and Noah Laba added the sixth goal of his rookie season with just under 10 minutes remaining before Lafrenière pulled the Blueshirts within three with 4:02 left.
But the first period made all of that an afterthought.
This is what a season falling apart looks like.
[Notigroup Newsroom in collaboration with other media outlets, with information from the following sources]
