After the Rangers swept the Washington Capitals out of the 2024 Stanley Cup Playoffs, it prompted curiosity about whether they’ve achieved similar feats in past playoff runs. Recent history shows this isn’t the first time they’ve accomplished such a decisive victory. Notably, they swept the Atlanta Thrashers in 2007 and before that, the hated New York Islanders in 1994.

Like this season, the 1994 team entered the playoffs as the President’s Trophy winners and faced the eight-seeded Islanders to start the second season.

Undoubtedly, 1994 marked a monumental year for the Rangers, culminating in their fourth Stanley Cup victory after a 54-year drought. However, their journey to that triumph began with a familiar adversary in the Eastern Conference Quarter-Finals: the Islanders.

In a display of dominance, the Rangers swiftly dispatched the Islanders in a four-game series. They started with back-to-back 6-0 victories, followed by a commanding 5-1 win in the third game. The series concluded with a 5-2 triumph in game four, showcasing the Rangers’ superiority on the ice. Throughout the series, they outscored the Islanders by an impressive margin of 22-3.

While the Rangers capitalized on their power play opportunities, scoring 8 goals out of 27 chances, the Islanders struggled to convert, managing only one goal out of 17 power play opportunities.

The Rangers, weary of dwelling on past letdowns and determined to carve their own path to Stanley Cup glory, approached their first-round series against the Islanders with relentless determination.

The Islanders, barely scraping into the playoffs, swiftly exited the postseason after a mere 240 minutes of hockey, a humbling experience for them and a source of pride for their metropolitan rivals. After enduring years of frustration against the Islanders, with taunts of “1940” echoing through the old Nassau Coliseum, the Rangers finally delivered a long-awaited dose of karma to their Long Island adversaries.

After this series, the Rangers would defeat the Washington Capitals in five games, New Jersey in seven, and Vancouver in seven to win the Stanley Cup. The Islanders would exit after round one of the 1994 playoffs and wouldn’t see the second season for another seven years, where they would lose in the conference quarterfinals to Toronto.

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