Artemi Panarin said he didn’t have a great feeling going into this season.
Still shaking off the lingering disappointment of last season’s first-round collapse against the Devils and the role he knew he played in it, the Russian star wing admitted he wasn’t confident in his first couple games, particularly in his passes.
Then he started shooting the puck more, and it started going in.
From there, Panarin attacked every game as if it were his last.
As if every contest was a chance to redeem himself.
No one made more of an impact on the Rangers’ most successful regular season in franchise history than Panarin.
His career-best 120-point campaign — the second-highest single-season total in Blueshirts’ history — somehow dazzled in real time even more than it does now on paper.
The only redemption tour that matters, however, begins with Game 1 of the Stanley Cup playoffs against the Capitals on Sunday afternoon at the Garden.
“I would love to think about the regular season right now, but I can’t,” Panarin told The Post before Game 82. “Now, none of my thoughts are about the regular season.”
The shininess of his newly shaved head wasn’t the only difference in Panarin in training camp.
There was a new air to him that felt lighter and looser, which certainly had something to do with the changing of the guard behind the bench.
Peter Laviolette seemingly empowered Panarin, who rattled off a laundry list of ways the first-year head coach influenced his start to the season by way of confidence, ice time, extra shifts and making him feel like a leader in the locker room.
“He’s not messing around,” Barclay Goodrow quipped when asked what he thought when he saw the haircut.
And when Laviolette put Alexis Lafreniere on the wing opposite Panarin, the Rangers suddenly had the pillars of what would become one of the most superior lines in the NHL.
Vincent Trocheck, who joined in Game 11 after Filip Chytil was lost for the season, said it was the most complete line he’d ever skated on in his career.
It was clear to his teammates that Panarin had a different way about him than in years past.
“I think in training camp, after all the noise of last year, the type of person he is, how driven he is, he’s not the type to run from that,” captain Jacob Trouba said.
Braden Schneider, among many others, considers Panarin to be one of the hardest-working players on the team.
He’s always early to the rink, Schneider noted, on top of the relentlessness with which he practices from different spots on the ice that you then see him score from in a game.
“Early on in the year, he came and you could see that he just wanted more,” the young defenseman said. “He’s always been a competitive guy, always has had that drive, but I don’t know, he had a look. He was scoring early, he was absolutely ridiculous throughout the start of the year and then he just kept going.”
The consensus in the Rangers’ locker room is that it all can be traced back to Panarin’s insatiable pursuit of being the best.
Whether it’s on the ice or the team pingpong tournament — in which he plays in the highest tier along with Mika Zibanejad and Igor Shesterkin — the 32-year-old is driven by the prospect of unrivaled success.
Panarin and the Rangers chewed through games this season, churning out wins and points alike. His individual 2023-24 highlight reel is endless, filled with three hat tricks, five game-winners, 11 game-tying goals and 34 multi-point games — in 14 of which he totaled three points or more.
“Game-changer,” Shesterkin said.
Heck, Panarin logged a point in 67 of 82 games on the way to posting career highs in goals (49), shots on goal (302) and shooting percentage (16.2).
“Kind of a killer,” Trouba chuckled. “When he’s got you where he wants you, he makes you pay.”
From the Stadium Series overtime winner 10 seconds in against the Islanders to his third-period, game-tying goal and shootout winner in a crucial game against the Panthers, Panarin was clutch in every sense of the word.
From a franchise-record 15-game point streak to start the season to a 13-game tear to capture a trifecta of the Metropolitan Division crown, the No. 1 seed in the Eastern Conference and the Presidents’ Trophy, Panarin maintained the same level over the course of the 82-game grind.
“The hunger,” Zibanejad said of what impressed him most. “Never satisfied. He’s been pushing himself. He’s been pushing all of us to keep going.”
Added Schneider: “He makes things happen out of nothing and he’s shooting the puck like I’ve never seen him shoot before. For me, I watch him and I’m like, ‘This guy’s got 120 points and he’s still working like a dog.’ I got to make sure I’m staying with that.”
Panarin’s happy-go-lucky presence has been contagious since he arrived on Broadway five years ago, and his elite skills have always made the players around him better.
The way the Rangers as a whole mirrored Panarin’s drive and persistence this season, however, was a resounding first in his New York tenure.
Panarin was at his best this regular season, and that’s why the Rangers were, too.
The same laws will apply this postseason.
