TARRYTOWN, N.Y. -- The New York Rangers blamed their own lackluster play for getting coach Peter Laviolette fired but said that "outside noise" this season contributed to their disastrous drop in the standings.
Laviolette was fired Saturday after the Rangers failed to make the playoffs after their Presidents' Trophy-winning 2023-24 season, in which they advanced to the Eastern Conference finals. Laviolette was the second consecutive Rangers coach fired after two seasons behind the bench. In 2023, he replaced Gerard Gallant, who made the conference finals in his first season with the Rangers and was fired after losing to New Jersey in the first round.
"Do we think too highly of ourselves after one good year? I don't know," center Mika Zibanejad said of this pattern.
"Obviously in a place like New York, you know what our expectations are," center Vincent Trocheck said. "After a season like last year, to come in here and not perform the way we needed to, coaches are often blamed. So it's tough."
Defenseman Adam Fox said the players didn't have any issues with Laviolette or his message. "I think you look around the league and whenever a coach gets fired, I think players kind of wear that pretty hard, because if we did our jobs, those coaches would still be here," he said.
The Rangers started strongly under Laviolette this season, going 12-4-1. But New York went 3-10-0 in December and could never find enough constancy after that to make the postseason cut.
"I think it started off good, even with some noise, and obviously once it kind of started to spiral, it was hard for us to grab that back. That's when the wheels just really fell off," Fox said.
That "noise" was a big topic of conversation in the Rangers' dressing room in their final day of media availability this season. The "noise" started last offseason, when general manager Chris Drury used waivers to get around well-liked forward Barclay Goodrow's no-trade clause and send him to last-place San Jose. He also tried to trade captain Jacob Trouba last summer before successfully moving him in December, again using waivers as a threat to get around his trade protection.
Forward Chris Kreider, who was also shopped in his 13th season with the Rangers, said those moves shook the locker room. "It's part of professional sports, but obviously at a certain point it does become somewhat of a distraction. Those two guys that were massive leaders for us and a big part of our room," he said.
Zibanejad echoed that. "I think [there's] frustration when you don't know everything. We don't know what's going on. Obviously, we don't have control over that kind of stuff, but it's still something that we talk about or we have to go through," he said. " It's two of our leaders. It's our captain and assistant captain and big parts of our locker room. So of course it shakes things around a bit."
Kreider became part of that noise when Drury circulated a memo to 31 other general managers on Nov. 24 to say that his team was open for business in the trade market -- specifically mentioning the availability of Trouba and Kreider.
"I mean, it wasn't the first time, [and] hopefully the last time that that kind of stuff comes out. That's part of professional sports. I'm lucky I don't have any social media, so I wasn't really aware of it until people close to me brought it to my attention," Kreider said. "This is home for me. This is the organization that gave me an opportunity to live out my dream. I've developed so many incredible relationships and grown up and spent so much time in this area. So obviously this is where I want to be and this is the group that I want to help in whatever fashion."
Zibanejad and Kreider are core players, but both had disappointing seasons. Zibanejad had just 29 points in his first 50 games before finding his offense again when the Rangers acquired J.T. Miller from Vancouver on Jan. 31. Kreider saw his goal total drop by 17 from last season, mustering only 30 points in 68 games. He said Monday that he was dealing with a series of ailments, including a back problem, a bout with vertigo in December and a hand injury in the Rangers' first game after the 4 Nations Face-Off in February.
"I think 'challenging' is the right word. We obviously went in with very high expectations for ourselves, and we didn't meet those expectations," Zibanejad said.
Veteran defenseman Calvin de Haan, who played only three games for the Rangers after being acquired from Colorado in March, was stunned this wasn't a playoff team.
"It was frustrating to see some of the goals we were letting in. I'm not pointing fingers at anyone; this is a group of five on the ice that just wasn't necessarily cohesive at times. But then there was flashes of brilliance where you're like, holy f---, this team should be in the playoffs. Frankly, you look at this team on paper and it would be crazy not to think that," he said.
The Rangers now face an offseason of uncertainty, from the fate of the rest of their core players to the next coach behind their bench. It's expected Drury will cast a wide net that includes veteran coaches and ones with much less NHL experience.
Fox said that, at the end of the day, it's all about the players shutting out the noise and getting back to the success they had in previous seasons.
"Whoever the next coach is, obviously it's on us to make sure there's sustained success not just a quick burst and then back to being mediocre," he said.
"Everyone has to really look in the mirror. This year was unrecognizable [from] the team that's made a conference final in two of the past three years. A lot of those characteristics and traits that led to that success weren't there this year."
In other Rangers news, forward Artemi Panarin declined to discuss a report in The Athletic last week that Panarin and Madison Square Garden Sports, which owns the Rangers, paid financial settlements to a former team employee last year after she alleged that Panarin had sexually assaulted her during a road trip in December 2023. Panarin said he would answer only questions about hockey in his final media availability of the season Monday.