The Rangers fired head coach Alain Vigneault Saturday night, following the Blueshirts’ 5-0 loss to the Flyers in the team’s 2017-18 season finale. The Rangers finished the season 34-39-9 and missed the playoffs for the first time in 2009-10.
Vigneault was 226-147-37 in five seasons behind the New York bench. He led the Rangers to the Stanley Cup Finals in his first season, 2013-14, and to the Eastern Conference Finals the following year.
The Rangers fell to the Islanders, 2-1, Thursday night at the Barclay Center, in the season’s next-to-last game of the season. Kevin Hayes scored his 25th goal of the season, a power-play goal just 4:25 into the game, for the Rangers’ only goal. The Blueshirts are now 1-4-1 in their last six games.
The Islanders got goals from Thomas Hickey and Anthony Beauvillier, and got 34 saves from Jaroslav Halak.
Ondrej Pavelec got the start, and stopped 20- of 22 shots he faced.
The Rangers [now 34-38-9, 75 pts] finished off the 2017-18 season Saturday afternoon in Philadelphia.