Madison Square Garden. The home of sports in Manhattan. The fourth and current incarnation of the historic arena opened on Feb. 14, 1968, and has been home to the NHL’s Rangers and NBA’s Knicks ever since, as well as several other professional sports teams, as well as countless concerts and events over the years. For those Rangers, the history of MSG and the franchise is thick, having had dozens of Hall of Fame players call the arena home, three Stanley Cup finals, and an All-Star Game take place within its walls.

The Rangers moved into the latest MSG during the first of the NHL Expansion Era years in 1968. Known as one of the weakest of the Original Six teams at that point, the Expansion years and newly rebuilt arena brought a revitalization to the franchise. The Rangers would make it to the Stanley Cup Finals twice, but lost both times; first to the Boston Bruins in 1972, then in 1979 to the Montreal Canadiens. The famous “goal-a-game” line of Jean Ratelle, Vic Hadfield, and Rod Gilbert lit up nets and fans for years. In a historic event in 1974, the Rangers lost to the Philadelphia Flyers in the semi-finals of the playoffs in seven games to become the first Original Six team to lose a series to an expansion team in the playoffs. Thankfully, they lost away from the Garden.

There’s been no greater time for the Rangers in the Garden than during the 1993-94 season, when they finally managed to end the drought and captured their fourth Stanley Cup, defeating the Vancouver Canucks in seven games. The Rangers finished the regular season by winning the President’s Trophy with a 52-24-8 record, the Rangers breezed through the first two rounds before going to seven games against the New Jersey Devils. In the finals against the Vancouver Canucks, the Rangers went up three games to one before dropping games six and seven convincingly. In the final game, Canucks captain scored two goals, but Mark Messier’s third period goal was enough to allow the Rangers to win their first championship in 54 years. The image of Messier raising the Cup still lingers in the minds of Rangers fans everywhere.

Along with Messier, there have been near-countless other great hockey players to play for the Rangers in MSG, including Phil Esposito, Pat LaFontaine, Brian Leetch, Adam Graves, Terry Sawchuk, Guy Lafleur, and of course, Wayne Gretzky. The amount of talented players that have come and gone through the years makes it rather unbelievable that the Rangers only have one Cup to show for it. Madison Square Garden is still going strong, and while operating and rental costs continue to rise, teams and promoters continue to line up for the self-proclaimed “World’s Busiest Arena”, and New Yorkers wouldn’t have it any other way.