Special to Sports News Highlights

(SNH) — Go to a Liverpool-Everton Merseyside Derby and you’ll soon hear the chant:

“Since 1995! Since 1995!

You haven’t won a trophy, you haven’t won a trophy, YOU HAVEN’T WON A TROPHY…

SINCE 1995!”

Liverpool’s supporters make sure the Everton faithful know that their club hasn’t won anything of note for nearly 30 years. When a team has gone a significant length of time without any championship hardware, hearing a year shouted at you as a fan can be quite perplexing.

Ask Cubs fans (1908!) Red Sox fans (1918!), and they’ll tell you how grating having years chanted at you can be. At least they can relax, for now.

Older New York Rangers fans can relate. For years, they had to listen to “1940!” chants lobbed at them by opposing fans. That was the last time the Rangers won the Stanley Cup, a drought that would extend for more than half a century.

Those chants stung even more after the expansion New York Islanders joined the NHL ahead of the 1972-73 season. The Islanders defeated the Rangers in the playoffs in just their third year of existence, before proceeding to win four straight Stanley Cup titles between 1980-83. To make matters worse, the Isles eliminated the Rangers in three of those title runs.

It wasn’t until 1994, when the Mark Messier-led “Broadway Blueshirts” disposed of 54 years of postseason misery with thrilling 7-game series wins over the New Jersey Devils in the Eastern Conference Finals and the Vancouver Canucks in the Stanley Cup Finals.

Fast forward 30 years, and 1994 is still the last Rangers Stanley Cup banner hanging in Madison Square Garden. That makes four titles in nearly 100 years for one of the NHL’s Original Six. And three of those championships came before the United States entered World War II.

Three decades is a long time. The last time the Rangers won, on June 14, 1994, Nelson Mandela had just recently been elected as the President of South Africa. O.J. Simpson’s infamous white Ford Bronco police chase would occur three days later. The U.S. was about to host its first World Cup that summer. Forest Gump and Pulp Fiction hadn’t yet hit theaters.

Now look: There are franchises with significantly longer droughts than 30 years in each of the four major U.S. sports. That includes the Islanders, who have not won since 1983.

There’s also plenty of teams that have never won a championship, or even been to the championship game or series. Look no further than the pain on the faces of the Detroit Lions’ faithful as their team lost to the San Francisco 49ers in this year’s NFC Championship game for a recent example. They’ve never been to the big game, and last won an NFL title in 1957.

Why bring this up? Because the Rangers have one of their best opportunities to win a Stanley Cup since 1994.

The team has come close recently. The Rangers lost the Eastern Conference Finals to the New Jersey Devils in 2012 and the Tampa Bay Lightning in both 2015 and 2022, and they fell to the Los Angeles Kings in five games in the Stanley Cup Finals in 2014.

Now, New York is in great position after winning the Presidents’ Trophy with a club-record 114 points and a sweep of the Washington Capitals in the first round of the playoffs.

Centers Mika Zibanejad and Vincent Trocheck combined for four goals and nine assists in the sweep, while goaltender Igor Shesterkin won all four games and posted a .930 save percentage. Winger Artemi Panarin led the team with 49 goals and 71 assists in the 2023-24 regular season and has two goals so far in the playoffs.

Next up in the Eastern Conference semis are the Carolina Hurricanes, who finished second behind the Rangers in the Metropolitan Division while tallying 111 points in the regular season, second most in the Eastern Conference. New York won 2-of-3 games against Carolina this season.

New York Rangers coach Peter Laviolette led the Hurricanes to a Stanley Cup in 2006, Carolina’s only title, and now needs to get past his former club to add to the Rangers’ haul.

And keep Rangers fans from hearing any maddening “1994!” chants in the future.

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