Revered Rangers goalie Jonathan Quick keeps putting the work in
Rangers goaltender Jonathan Quick skates to the net against the Ottawa Senators at Madison Square Garden on Jan. 14, 2026. Credit: Kathleen Malone-Van Dyke
LOS ANGELES — Barring something completely unexpected, Jonathan Quick will be a Hockey Hall of Famer three years after he retires from the NHL.
It will only take three years because that’s the required time players have to wait after they stop playing before they can be considered from enshrinement. But the body of work he’s built over his 18 years (and counting?) in the NHL make Quick, the all-time leader in victories by an American-born goaltender with 407 before Tuesday’s start against his old team, the L.A. Kings, a shoo-in to join the game’s all-time greats the minute he’s eligible.
“I've said this so many times: I think he's a first ballot Hall of Famer,’’ Rangers coach Mike Sullivan said before the Blueshirts took on the Kings. “I mean, with what he did in his years here in LA to help those teams win Stanley Cups, the way they did, he was such a huge part of it. He was a cornerstone of those teams. And he continues to perform at elite level at 40 years old. It’s just impressive. He's an inspiration for me.’’
Quick turns 40 on Wednesday, and he was certainly hoping for an early birthday present Tuesday in the form of a win. He last won Nov. 7, and he’d lost 11 straight decisions (0-9-2), due to a combination of bad luck, bad timing (with the team not playing as well defensively as earlier in the season), and perhaps a heavier than optimal workload in the wake of Igor Shesterkin’s lower-body injury.
Quick doesn’t speak to the media on days he plays until after the game, and while he talked to Newsday on Monday, before the Rangers lost to Anaheim 5-3, with Spencer Martin in goal, he wouldn’t talk about facing the Kings. He was willing to speak in more general terms, like about his recent run of results, and how he maintains his confidence even when things aren’t going well on the ice.
“I’ve played a lot of games in this league, a lot of seasons in this league, and I know there's stretches where pucks are hitting you, and there’s stretches where pucks aren't,’’ he said. “The approach, really, it's always the same. From my experience, always the work that you put in usually will show come game time. At times, maybe you're not getting the results based on the amount of work you put in, but that's the nature of the league at times.’’
Knowing that keeps him sane and calm when he knows he’s playing well, but perhaps the team isn’t playing well in front of him, or the opposing goalie happens to be unbeatable on a given night, or simply, the breaks are just going against him.
“It's understanding that's hockey,’’ he said. “That's hockey. It's, you win and lose as a group, and it's [not good] to kind of look at it from a sense of, your own personal statistics. [That’s] a lot of stuff to fill your head with.
“In a business where you're very… results oriented, [and] you want to win games, it's the results that matter,’’ he said. “But then when you focus too much on the result, you lose sight of the process. And ultimately, that's what it is about. Because you can't control results. You control the process. You can truly work. Even though you're fighting and clawing to try to get wins, it's dangerous to go in thinking, ‘I gotta win.’ Because then, you kind of lose sight of what's gonna allow you to win.’’
Surely, the Rangers had every intention of trying hard to win Tuesday’s game for Quick, who’s a leader and a beloved teammate in the locker room.
“Anytime Quickie's in the net, we just want to do our best for him, just because obviously, he still works so hard, he's still one of the best, still so athletic,’’ said defenseman Carson Soucy, who returned to the lineup Tuesday after missing two games following the birth of his daughter. “We've just kind of underachieved as a team. We feel like we've kind of let our goalies down at certain points. So obviously, coming back here, it'd be nice to get a win for him.’’
The reality is that the Rangers haven’t been good this season, and right now they are without their two most indispensable players in Shesterkin and defenseman Adam Fox, both out with lower-body injuries. So as much as they want to win for Quick, actually pulling it off is easier said than done.
But, as the man himself said, that’s hockey.
Colin Stephenson covers the Rangers for Newsday. He has spent more than two decades covering the NHL and just about every sports team in the New York metropolitan area.
