Islanders–Rangers rivalry - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

New York Rangers–New York Islanders
History
1st Meeting	October 21, 1972
1st Result	NYR: 2-1
Location	Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum The Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum is a multi-purpose indoor arena in Uniondale, New York, United States. Home to the New York Islanders of the National Hockey League, the Coliseum is located approximately east of New York City on Long Island...
Last Meeting	March 31, 2011
Last Result	NYI: 6-2
Location	Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum
Next Meeting	October 15,2011
Location	Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum
Number of Meetings	234
Regular Season Series	NYR: 112-98-19-5 (.532)
Post Season History
Post Season Series	NYI: 5-3 (.625)
Post Season Games	NYI: 20-19 (.513)
Series 1975 NHLP	Islanders won, 2–1
1979 NHLSF	Rangers won, 4–2
1981 NHLSF	Islanders won, 4–0
1982 PDF	Islanders won, 4–2
1983 PDF	Islanders won, 4–2
1984 PDSF	Islanders won, 3–2
1990 PDSF 1990 Stanley Cup playoffs The 1990 Stanley Cup Playoffs for the National Hockey League championship began on April 5, 1990, following the 1989–90 regular season. The sixteen teams that qualified, from the top four teams of the four divisions, played best-of-seven series with re-seeding after the division finals...	Rangers won, 4–1
1994 ECQF 1994 Stanley Cup Playoffs The 1994 Stanley Cup playoffs, the championship of the National Hockey League , began after the conclusion of the 1993–94 NHL season. The sixteen teams that qualified, eight from each conference, played best-of-7 series for conference quarterfinals, semifinals and championships, and then the...	Rangers won, 4–0

The Islanders-Rangers rivalry, also unofficially known as the "Battle of New York", is unique among New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

's major league sports, as the Rangers

New York Rangers

The New York Rangers are a professional ice hockey team based in the borough of Manhattan in New York, New York, USA. They are members of the Atlantic Division of the Eastern Conference of the National Hockey League . Playing their home games at Madison Square Garden, the Rangers are one of the...

and the Islanders

New York Islanders

The New York Islanders are a professional ice hockey team based in Uniondale, New York. They are members of the Atlantic Division of the Eastern Conference of the National Hockey League...

are in the same conference and division, guaranteeing plenty of matchups. Major League Baseball

Major League Baseball

Major League Baseball is the highest level of professional baseball in the United States and Canada, consisting of teams that play in the National League and the American League...

's New York Yankees

New York Yankees

The New York Yankees are a professional baseball team based in the The Bronx, New York. They compete in Major League Baseball in the American League's East Division...

and New York Mets

New York Mets

The New York Mets are a professional baseball team based in the borough of Queens in New York City, New York. They belong to Major League Baseball's National League East Division. One of baseball's first expansion teams, the Mets were founded in 1962 to replace New York's departed National League...

are in different leagues

Sports league

League is a term commonly used to describe a group of sports teams or individual athletes that compete against each other in a specific sport. At its simplest, it may be a local group of amateur athletes who form teams among themselves and compete on weekends; at its most complex, it can be an...

while the National Football League

National Football League

The National Football League is the highest level of professional American football in the United States, and is considered the top professional American football league in the world. It was formed by eleven teams in 1920 as the American Professional Football Association, with the league changing...

's New York Jets

New York Jets

The New York Jets are a professional football team headquartered in Florham Park, New Jersey, representing the New York metropolitan area. The team is a member of the Eastern Division of the American Football Conference in the National Football League...

and New York Giants

New York Giants

The New York Giants are a professional American football team based in East Rutherford, New Jersey, representing the New York City metropolitan area. The Giants are currently members of the Eastern Division of the National Football Conference in the National Football League...

are in different conferences, so the only meeting opportunities are during inter-league or playoff games.

Background

This rivalry was established when the NHL

National Hockey League

The National Hockey League is an unincorporated not-for-profit association which operates a major professional ice hockey league of 30 franchised member clubs, of which 7 are currently located in Canada and 23 in the United States...

awarded a second franchise in the New York metropolitan area

New York metropolitan area

The New York metropolitan area, also known as Greater New York, or the Tri-State area, is the region that composes of New York City and the surrounding region...

. With the impending start of the World Hockey Association

World Hockey Association

The World Hockey Association was a professional ice hockey league that operated in North America from 1972 to 1979. It was the first major competition for the National Hockey League since the collapse of the Western Hockey League in 1926...

in the fall of 1972, the upstart league had plans to place a team, the Raiders, in the then-new Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum

Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum

The Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum is a multi-purpose indoor arena in Uniondale, New York, United States. Home to the New York Islanders of the National Hockey League, the Coliseum is located approximately east of New York City on Long Island...

in Nassau County

Nassau County, New York

Nassau County is a suburban county on Long Island, east of New York City in the U.S. state of New York, within the New York Metropolitan Area. As of the 2010 census, the population was 1,339,532...

. The National Hockey League

National Hockey League

did not want competition in the nation's largest metro area, so despite having expanded two years before, the NHL awarded franchises to Atlanta

Atlanta Flames

The Atlanta Flames were a professional ice hockey team based in Atlanta, Georgia, USA from 1972 to 1980. The team, a member of the National Hockey League , was relocated to Calgary, Alberta, Canada for the start of the 1980–81 NHL season and were re-named the Calgary Flames. The NHL returned to the...

and Long Island

Long Island

Long Island is an island located in the southeast part of the U.S. state of New York, just east of Manhattan. Stretching northeast into the Atlantic Ocean, Long Island contains four counties, two of which are boroughs of New York City , and two of which are mainly suburban...

to preempt the WHA. The fledgling New York Islanders

New York Islanders

The New York Islanders are a professional ice hockey team based in Uniondale, New York. They are members of the Atlantic Division of the Eastern Conference of the National Hockey League...

had an extra burden to pay in the form of a $4 million territorial fee to the nearby New York Rangers

New York Rangers

Playoffs

In 1975, the Islanders made their first trip to the NHL playoffs, facing the heavily favored Rangers in a best-of-three first-round series. After splitting the first two games, the Islanders won Game 3, and the series, when J. P. Parise scored 11 seconds into overtime. The teams met again in the 1979 playoffs; this time the underdog Rangers were victorious, eliminating the heavily favoured Islanders in 6 games and earning a spot in the Stanley Cup Finals

1979 Stanley Cup Finals

The 1979 Stanley Cup Final NHL championship series was contested by the New York Rangers and the defending champion Montreal Canadiens, making their fourth straight appearance. It was New York's first appearance since . The Canadiens would win the best-of-seven series four games to one, to win...

. This was particularly memorable as it continued the Islanders' reputation for playoff "chokes" despite finishing first in the league

Presidents' Trophy

The Presidents' Trophy is an award presented by the National Hockey League to the team that finishes with the most points in the league during the regular season. If two teams tie for the most points, then the trophy goes to the team with the most wins. The winning team is also awarded C$350,000...

during the regular season.

The teams also met in the playoffs every year from 1981–84; the Islanders won each series by margins of 4-0, 4-2, 4-2 and 3-2 enroute to 5 finals and four Stanley Cups (in addition to their win to make it four championships and 5 finals in a row). In the 1990s, the teams met twice, with the Rangers winning 4-1 in 1990, and sweeping the Islanders 4-0 in 1994, en route to winning their first Stanley Cup since 1940. The 1994 playoff series is the most recent meeting between the two teams in the playoffs.

Regular season

The rivalry heated up in the regular season. Before the season the Islanders attempt to updating their look resulted in the unveiling of the fisherman logo, it proved to be such a disaster as Rangers fans mock the Islanders with chants of "we want fishsticks", which is a reference to the way the logo resembled the Gorton

Gorton's of Gloucester

Gorton’s of Gloucester is a subsidiary of the Japanese seafood conglomerate Nippon Suisan Kaisha, Ltd., producing fishsticks and other frozen seafood for the retail market in the United States. Gorton’s also has a North American foodservice business which sells to fast-food restaurants such as...

's fisherman. The Islanders soon reverted back to their original logo with an updated color scheme in late 1996.

Fan reaction

With both teams' fans visiting "enemy territory" for games, organized shouting matches and fights break out in the stands. Ranger fans often refer to the Nassau Coliseum

Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum

as "Garden East" or the "Mausoleum", as Ranger fans often make up almost half of crowd when they visit. The Rangers' fanbase generally comes from the city's five boroughs, Westchester, Fairfield

Fairfield County, Connecticut

Fairfield County is a county located in the southwestern corner of the U.S. state of Connecticut. The county population is 916,829 according to the 2010 Census. There are currently 1,465 people per square mile in the county. It is the most populous county in the State of Connecticut and contains...

, Long Island

Long Island

and Rockland Counties, and from Northern and Central New Jersey, while the Islanders tend to draw fans from Nassau

Nassau County, New York

Nassau County is a suburban county on Long Island, east of New York City in the U.S. state of New York, within the New York Metropolitan Area. As of the 2010 census, the population was 1,339,532...

and Suffolk

Suffolk

Suffolk is a non-metropolitan county of historic origin in East Anglia, England. It has borders with Norfolk to the north, Cambridgeshire to the west and Essex to the south. The North Sea lies to the east...

counties, and parts of eastern Queens

Queens

Queens is the easternmost of the five boroughs of New York City. The largest borough in area and the second-largest in population, it is coextensive with Queens County, an administrative division of New York state, in the United States....

. Fans will direct derisive chants at their rivals regardless of whether the teams are actually playing. At each home game, Ranger fans engage in perhaps their most popular chant: whistling the song "Let's Go Band" and punctuating it with "Potvin sucks

History of the New York Rangers

-Early years:In 1925, the New York Americans joined the National Hockey League, playing in Madison Square Garden. The Amerks proved to be an even greater success than expected, leading Garden president Tex Rickard to go after a team for the Garden despite promising the Amerks that they would be the...

". This is a reference to retired Islander Hall of Fame

Hockey Hall of Fame

The Hockey Hall of Fame is located in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Dedicated to the history of ice hockey, it is both a museum and a hall of fame. It holds exhibits about players, teams, National Hockey League records, memorabilia and NHL trophies, including the Stanley Cup...

defenseman

Defenceman (ice hockey)

Defence in ice hockey is a player position whose primary responsibility is to prevent the opposing team from scoring...

Denis Potvin

Denis Charles Potvin is a former defenseman and team captain for the New York Islanders in the National Hockey League and cornerstone for the Islanders' four Stanley Cup championship teams in the early 1980s. His brother, Jean Potvin, was also an NHL defenseman and the brothers were teammates for...

, who angered Rangers fans by breaking Center Ulf Nilsson's ankle on a clean check. Rangers fans also occasionally bring out the chant "Beat your wife, Potvin, beat your wife", a reference to unconfirmed allegations that Potvin has committed domestic abuse. Lastly, Rangers Fans have taunted Islanders goaltender Rick DiPietro

Rick DiPietro

Rick DiPietro, Jr. is an American professional ice hockey goaltender currently playing for the New York Islanders of the National Hockey League . He was the first overall selection by the Islanders in the 2000 NHL Entry Draft....

by chanting "DP Sucks!"

Islander fans taunted Rangers fans for many years with the chant "1940!

Curse of 1940

The Curse of 1940, also called Dutton's Curse, was a superstitious explanation for why the New York Rangers of the National Hockey League did not win the league's championship trophy, the Stanley Cup, from 1940 to 1994.-Popular theories:...

" referring to the Rangers having the all-time longest drought without winning the Stanley Cup

Stanley Cup

The Stanley Cup is an ice hockey club trophy, awarded annually to the National Hockey League playoffs champion after the conclusion of the Stanley Cup Finals. It has been referred to as The Cup, Lord Stanley's Cup, The Holy Grail, or facetiously as Lord Stanley's Mug...

, until the Blueshirts finally won in . For a period in the late '90s and early 2000s, Islanders fans would punctuate the "Chicken Dance

Chicken Dance

The "Chicken Dance" is an oom-pah song and its associated fad dance is now a contemporary American folk dance. The song was composed by accordion player Werner Thomas from Davos, Switzerland, in the 1950s....

" with chants of "the Rangers suck." The Islanders had stopped playing the song at games for a length of time but as of the 2007–08 season the song is played solely at Islanders-Rangers games. Rangers winger Theoren Fleury

Theoren Fleury

Theoren Wallace "Theo" Fleury is a Canadian former professional ice hockey player for the Calgary Flames, Colorado Avalanche, New York Rangers, and Chicago Blackhawks of the National Hockey League , Tappara of Finland's SM-liiga, and the Belfast Giants of the UK's Elite Ice Hockey League...

used the chant as an excuse for flapping his arms to taunt Islanders enforcer

Enforcer (hockey)

Enforcer is an unofficial role in ice hockey. The term is sometimes used synonymously with "fighter", "tough guy", or "goon". NHL players regarded as enforcers include Tiger Williams, Tony Twist, Bob Probert, Dave Semenko, Dave Schultz, Tie Domi, Dave Brown, Joey Kocur, Clark Gillies, Stu Grimson,...

Eric Cairns

Eric Cairns is a retired ice hockey defenceman and current pro scout for the New York Islanders. His last season was with the Pittsburgh Penguins of the NHL...

. In addition a popular chant was "Crackhead Theo!" referring to Fleury's erratic behavior and history of substance abuse at the time. Islanders fans also sing a song to the tune of "If You're Happy and You Know It", replacing the standard lyrics with "If you know the Rangers suck, clap your hands." In the early 1990s a group of boisterous fans at Nassau Coliseum would sit in section 329 and mock Rangers announcer Sam Rosen

Sam Rosen (sportscaster)

Sam Rosen is an American sportscaster, best known as the primary play-by-play announcer for the New York Rangers games on MSG. On June 8, 2008, Rosen was inducted into the National Jewish Sports Hall of Fame....

's tag line "It's a power play goal" by announcing in unison "it's a power play goal, screw you Sam Rosen" after each Islander Power Play Goal.

Incidents

One well-known incident at an Islanders/Philadelphia Flyers

Philadelphia Flyers

The Philadelphia Flyers are a professional ice hockey team based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. They are members of the Atlantic Division of the Eastern Conference of the National Hockey League...

game in 2003 turned an innocent holiday promotion at Nassau Coliseum into a on-ice shoving match between Rangers and Islanders fans in Santa suits.

One incident that has been rumored was a brawl between fans of the two teams at a New York Mets

New York Mets

game at Shea Stadium

Shea Stadium

William A. Shea Municipal Stadium, usually shortened to Shea Stadium or just Shea , was a stadium in the New York City borough of Queens, in Flushing Meadows–Corona Park. It was the home baseball park of Major League Baseball's New York Mets from 1964 to 2008...

in the late 1970s or early 1980s.

As of 2008, the Rangers and Islanders are tied in the all-time series with 100 wins, 100 losses (including overtime and shootout losses), and 19 ties. In the playoffs, however, the Islanders hold the lead with a 20-19 record, and have won five of the eight playoff series' between the two teams.

Miscellaneous

Since 2001, the Pat LaFontaine

Pat LaFontaine

Patrick Michael LaFontaine is an American former ice hockey center in the National Hockey League who spent his entire career playing for the league's New York-based teams; LaFontaine skated for the New York Islanders from 1983 until 1991, the Buffalo Sabres from 1991 until 1997, and the New York...

Trophy has been awarded to the winner of the Rangers-Islanders regular season series. The winning team receives a trophy to parade around for their fans and bragging rights for another year, while the losing team must make a $50,000 contribution to the charity of Pat LaFontaine's choice. LaFontaine played for both teams in his career-- the Islanders at the beginning, and the Rangers at the end (he played for the Buffalo Sabres

Buffalo Sabres

The Buffalo Sabres are a professional ice hockey team based in Buffalo, New York. They are members of the Northeast Division of the Eastern Conference of the National Hockey League .-Founding and early success: 1970-71—1980-81:...

in between, making him one of the few players to have played for all three teams based in the state of New York).

Greg Gilbert

Greg Gilbert

Gregory Scott Gilbert is a retired former professional ice hockey player who played 15 seasons in the National Hockey League before retiring from his playing career to become a coach. Gilbert was the head coach of the Calgary Flames....

won the Stanley Cup with both teams and is the only player to do so with both New York City hockey teams, winning with the Islanders in and and with the Rangers in 1994. In addition, Neil Smith served as general manager of both teams.

During the season, there was a moment of peace in the rivalry with both head coaches, Rangers' John Tortorella

John Tortorella

Jonathan "John" Tortorella is an American professional ice hockey coach and is now the head coach of the New York Rangers of the National Hockey League . He is perhaps best known for his tenure as head coach of the Tampa Bay Lightning when he led the team to the 2004 Stanley Cup championship...

and Islanders' Scott Gordon

Scott Gordon

Scott Gordon is an American born professional hockey coach and former professional hockey goaltender. He is an assistant coach with the Toronto Maple Leafs of the National Hockey League and a former head coach of the American Hockey League's Providence Bruins and the National Hockey League's New...

winning silver medals as assistant coaches for the U.S. men's ice hockey team

Ice hockey at the 2010 Winter Olympics

Ice hockey at the 2010 Winter Olympics was held at Canada Hockey Place, home of the National Hockey League's Vancouver Canucks, and at UBC Winter Sports Centre, home of the Canadian Interuniversity Sport's UBC Thunderbirds. Twelve teams competed in the men's event and eight teams competed in the...

during the Vancouver Olympics

2010 Winter Olympics

The 2010 Winter Olympics, officially the XXI Olympic Winter Games or the 21st Winter Olympics, were a major international multi-sport event held from February 12–28, 2010, in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, with some events held in the suburbs of Richmond, West Vancouver and the University...

, under Toronto Maple Leafs

Toronto Maple Leafs

The Toronto Maple Leafs are a professional ice hockey team based in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. They are members of the Northeast Division of the Eastern Conference of the National Hockey League...

Coach Ron Wilson, the head coach.

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