This is the exact week weary Rangers have been waiting for

The Rangers needed a break.

This has been an arduous first 48 games for the Blueshirts. It’s not unexpected they’re at a middling 21-20-7 as their bye week begins and segues right into All-Star weekend, culminating in nine days off before they return for a Jan. 29 Garden match against the Flyers.

But it has been trying in the fact that there have been large stretches of good that got some a bit starry-eyed for the postseason, and large stretches of bad that got some thinking about intentionally losing to better their chance at projected top draft pick Jack Hughes.

The emotional ups and down have taken their toll, both on the veterans who haven’t been through something quite like this before and on the swath of young players who are just trying to figure their way around this league. Of course, first-year head coach David Quinn has also seemed to take every win and loss personally, which won’t be good for his health or his hairline.

“I’m just really proud of the way we played the last week,” Quinn said after his team finished off a three-game winning streak with a 3-2 road win over the Bruins on Saturday night. “You see a nine-day break and you could get distracted. Your mind could be in different places. But we did a heck of a job in these three games in the last six days of really being dialed in and wanting to finish on a high note. And we did it.”

Quinn has had quite a few issues to deal with in his first few months on the job, which includes figuring out how to teach the way he’s used to with such limited practice time. But he has implemented a revitalized sense of accountability. He has scratched rookies and veterans with just about the same frequency, based on their performances. The same can be said about players earning ice time based on how they’re playing.

This season was always going to be about development, even if there were some thoughts of a potential playoff push when they went 9-1-1 leading into Thanksgiving. But they came out after that holiday with a brutal stretch of hockey, coming to a head with a five-game losing streak that was snapped on Jan. 12 with the team’s first-ever win over the Islanders in Brooklyn. But if they felt good about that win, they followed it up the next night with arguably their worst performance of the season in Columbus, a 7-5 loss when Quinn was so mad he called the team’s effort “just ridiculous” and “a joke.”

But then they got the soft underbelly of the schedule, beating up on their own personal Washington Generals when the Hurricanes came in on Tuesday to lose their 16th straight on Broadway, followed Thursday by the 30th-overall Blackhawks and minor league goalie Collin Delia making a second win not incredibly difficult.

Yet the victory in Boston was different. It was a terrific game as both sides played with a perceptible knowledge it was their final game before a long break. The Rangers were far from perfect, but were perfectly happy with being good enough.

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“It’s been a grind, for different reasons, up and down,” said goalie Henrik Lundqvist, now sixth on the all-time wins list and the team’s lone representative at the All-Star Game in San Jose this weekend. “I think it’s good to get a break and also reflect on why did we have a really good week here. I hope we all do that and understand how focused [we were] and how we paid attention to all the details in our game this week. That’s why we’ve been winning. Just that focus on the details, that’s what wins you games in this league. It’s very important that we understand that.

“Maybe we can do that on the beach somewhere, then come back recharged. We can’t look at the big picture. Can we get in? Are we still in the race? We just have to take it week-by-week here and continue to improve as a group.”

And when asked if he wished the team could keep playing with the way it has been going, Lundqvist gave a hearty laugh and shake of the head.

“I’ve been waiting for this week,” he said.