OTTAWA — It’s funny how when a team is an underdog, the players and coaches never hesitate to bring it up, and when a team is a favorite, they brush it off as if it means nothing.
At least, that’s the way the Rangers are approaching this flip of the script, going from slight underdogs in their first-round series with the Canadiens, which they won in six games, to a relatively heavy favorite against the Senators in the second round, which starts with Game 1 on Thursday night at Canadian Tire Centre.
Reminded how often he said the Canadiens were “highly favored,” coach Alain Vigneault balked after Tuesday’s practice in Westchester, the final tune-up before the Rangers left for Canada’s capital.
“I did? I don’t remember that,” Vigneault joked. “I know I said it in French, that it was mainly to keep you guys [the media] busy. It is what it is. Coaches throw things out there.”
Well then, how about Vigneault’s counterpart in this series, Guy Boucher, throwing this out there in his pre-series fodder Tuesday?
“From what I hear from everybody, we don’t seem to have much of a chance,” Boucher told reporters in Ottawa, according to The Citizen. “They’re 10-1 in Vegas against us and everybody seems to think they’re going to roll all over us. Everybody seems to think that they’re going to roll all over us so I guess they’re a pretty good team.”
Boucher might use the Vegas odds — in reality, the Senators are listed as roughly 5-4 underdogs — to motivate his team, just as Vigneault used it for the same purpose in the first round. But when it gets down to it, the truth for all teams at this point is they are not bringing the odds out onto the ice with them. With just eight clubs remaining with a chance to win the Stanley Cup, the pressure is on everyone just about equally.
“I’m pretty sure if you would ask each and every one of their players, they believe they can win. And if you would ask each and every one of our players, they believe they can win,” Vigneault said. “At the end of the day, whether we’re favorites or they’re favorites, according to the experts, it doesn’t really matter. What matters is we need to go out on the ice, we’ve come up with a plan that we feel is going to be effective, is going to give us a chance to win.
“I really believe that we had some guys play well against Montreal, but there is another level to find here. There’s another level of compete and another level of making plays on the ice that we need to find to be able to beat Ottawa. It’s that simple.”
If the experts think the Senators are an easy matchup, the Rangers don’t — and they’re right. The neutral-zone trap Boucher runs has given the Blueshirts fits all season, keeping them from their high-paced transition game. It also forces them to be patient and smart with the puck, which has not exactly been a strong suit.
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“Part of our identity has been to be able to continue to play fast, and play fast with and without the puck,” Vigneault said. “We need that identity to stay, even though the physicality is part of the playoffs. Our No. 1 thing is going to have to be to play a fast, high-tempo game. Get out of our end and get into theirs.”
That has been a focus of the Rangers since the start of the season, when expectations hardly had them as a possible favorite in a second-round playoff series. So for them, at this point, how everyone else is looking at the series really doesn’t matter.
“I don’t think we had very many expectations on us all year long, and I think that’s kind of the mindset we’ve had for most of the year,” defenseman Marc Staal said. “That’s not going to change in the playoffs with who we’re playing.
“I think this group has done a better job of narrowing our focus down. We went into training camp and focused on how we’re getting better every day, and throughout the season, same kind of thing. I think that’s helped us along the way, and it’s going to help us throughout the playoffs.”