Curse of 1940

However, their original owner, bootlegger Bill Dwyer, found the going difficult with the end of Prohibition, and the NHL took over ownership of the team in 1937.

[2] He was named NHL President upon the death of Frank Calder in 1943, a post he held until 1946, when he resigned and was replaced by Clarence Campbell.

The Madison Square Garden Corporation found it could make more money when Ringling Brothers Barnum and Bailey Circus came to town in the spring.

This forced the Rangers, and later the National Basketball Association's (NBA) New York Knicks, to use different arenas at the worst possible time—during their respective leagues' playoffs.

At the time, it was impossible to configure arenas in a way that would allow a circus and a hockey or basketball game to take place on the same day.

After the Blueshirts took a 3–2 series lead on the Detroit Red Wings, the NHL cited an obscure rule stating that the deciding game in a Stanley Cup Finals cannot be played on neutral ice.

Notably, career minor-league goaltender Ken McAuley gave up 310 goals in the team's 50 games, a league record for worst goals-against-average (6.2 goals/game) that has stood since.

(The closest any goalie since has come to equalling this record is Greg Millen, who allowed 282 goals in 60 games for the Hartford Whalers forty seasons later).

[4] Also during this time, the NHL still held territorial drafts, in which teams would get first rights to players who played junior hockey within a 50-mile radius of the home stadium; this gave Toronto, Detroit and Montreal significant recruiting advantages, since the areas around those cities were far more developed in their junior hockey programs than those further from the Canada–US border, including the Rangers.

In 1972, they reached the Stanley Cup Finals for the first time in 22 years but lost to the Boston Bruins, who were led by Bobby Orr and Phil Esposito.

The next season, with hopes high, the Rangers finished last in the Patrick Division, largely because of an injury to their star defenseman Brian Leetch.

In the kind of incident many fans ascribe to curses, Leetch arrived at the Garden in a taxi, stepped out, and broke his ankle when he slipped on a patch of ice, a most ironic injury for a hockey player.

The Rangers stormed through the 1993–94 regular season, scoring 112 points en route to clinching their second Presidents' Trophy in three years.

"[10] The Rangers fell behind 2–0, but trailing 2–1 in the third period, Messier scored a natural hat trick (three straight goals) to make good on his guarantee and force a deciding seventh game.

[10][11] The Rangers moved on to the Stanley Cup Finals against the Vancouver Canucks and took a 3–2 lead late in the third period of the deciding seventh game.

[12] Both of them, deciding that the officials wouldn't call a penalty at such a dramatic moment, committed infractions on the final drop of the puck as first MacTavish, then Messier whacked and cross-checked Vancouver's star forward Pavel Bure.