NEW YORK -- Back-to-back wins. Four wins in five games. Five in seven since Jan. 5. Points in all seven.
The resurgent New York Rangers are playing like a different team than prior to the holiday break last month.
They're playing like a team that believes again.
"You ask any team, when they're winning games it's just a lot better vibe and a lot better energy," defenseman Adam Fox said. "It was easy for us to kind of pack it in when things were going bad, we were dropping in the standings, but we know the team we have in here. We know what we're capable of. I think we're just taking it game by game and trying to just work our way back up the standings."
The next test comes quick; New York (22-20-3) visits the Montreal Canadiens at Bell Centre on Sunday (7 p.m. ET; NHLN, TSN2, MSG, RDS).
The Canadiens (22-19-4) are yet another team on the schedule ahead of the Rangers in the Eastern Conference standings, but the difference is just one point after Montreal’s six-game point streak (5-0-1) ended with a 7-3 loss to the Toronto Maple Leafs on Saturday.
The Canadiens led 3-0 after the first period before allowing seven unanswered goals. So, they might be angry entering the second game of a back-to-back, but the Rangers can mitigate that because they're finally carrying some confidence and swagger again.
"Winning games, confidence is coming back, or is back, and we're just playing better hockey all around," center Vincent Trocheck said. "Whenever you play a smarter, better brand of hockey, then you just feel more confident about your game. Going into games, or going into second or third periods down, or not playing as well as you'd like, you have the confidence to turn that around."
This is really the first time New York has felt the way Trocheck describes all season.
Even when they were 12-4-1, the Rangers weren't happy with their game or how they were playing. They knew then it wasn't sustainable. Then they lost 15 of 19 games, the foundation looking like it was crumbling with drama all around them.
Their now former captain, Jacob Trouba, was unceremoniously traded to the Anaheim Ducks on Dec. 7.
Of note, Uhro Vaakanainen, who was sent to New York in that trade, has been a regular on the third defense pair, a quiet contributor who won't dazzle but doesn't hurt either.
Kaapo Kakko was scratched in St. Louis on Dec. 15 when he thought he shouldn't have been. He went public with his frustrations on Dec. 17, and then the next day he was traded to the Seattle Kraken with defenseman Will Borgen coming back in that deal.
Also of note, Borgen has been a regular on the Rangers’ second defense pair with K'Andre Miller. He's replaced Trouba's size and some of his physicality.
Chris Kreider was a healthy scratch against the New Jersey Devils on Dec. 23, the final game before the holiday break, when New York lost 5-0 and was outshot 30-12.
That was a low point, but as it turns out it wasn't a breaking point.
"I think the mood in the locker room has changed tremendously ever since we got back from break," Miller said. "I think everybody used that as a reset, put our previous games behind us, came back and used it as a new start to a new season 40 games in."
The wins didn't come right away. In fact, the Rangers came out of the break with road games at the Tampa Bay Lightning on Dec. 28 and the Florida Panthers on Dec. 30. They lost to the Lightning 6-2 and 5-3 to the Panthers.
But they liked how they played in those games despite the lopsided results. They had 44 shots on goal against the Lightning; Andrei Vasilevskiy was just too good. They had 35 shots on goal against the Panthers.
"I thought we played really well," coach Peter Laviolette said. "We lost games there that I thought we did enough to win, but at the end of the day that doesn't matter. It goes to the scoreboard and that's the team that gets the points, but we did talk about the way we were playing the game and we liked what we were doing.
“There was a lot of games earlier in the year we didn't like, and we addressed it. If you're watching it and you go back and watch it again, you'll think it's the right recipe for success. You have to pound that home."
The Rangers have been consistently getting the results they want since the calendar flipped to 2025. The point streak began Jan. 5 with a 6-2 win at the Chicago Blackhawks. In the past 10 days, they're 4-0-1 with victories against the Devils, Vegas Golden Knights, Utah Hockey Club and Columbus Blue Jackets.
Their 1-3-1 defensive structure has held strong. They're locking when they're supposed to lock. They're not running around. Igor Shesterkin has been outstanding with nine goals allowed in the past five games. They're trusting the system.
"Less thought, I think, so the effort is more instinctual," Trocheck said. "Everybody is always going to give it their all. I don't think anybody is not going to do that. But before we were almost thinking a little bit too much and almost maybe trying too hard, but now it seems like we have our confidence back and the effort is just more instinctual."
Staying the course in Montreal is the next step.
It'll be hard. It's the Rangers’ third game in four days in three different cities. Shesterkin probably won't be in net; it'll likely be Jonathan Quick taking his third crack at becoming the first United States-born goalie to win 400 games.
A month ago, it would have been a loss waiting to happen. Now things just feel different.
The Rangers believe again.
"Winning does that," Laviolette said. "I got asked this when we were losing, it wasn't going our way, the confidence [was lacking]. You have to do the right things in order to get a win, but at the end of the day it's the winning that helps build the confidence."
