Through the Grinder

It took five years-not to mention a lockout, a salary cap and a new coach-for Dominic Moore to make it with the Rangers. Lucky for them he did

It's a perfect September night in upstate New York. West Point, to be exact. Not too hot, not too cold. No humidity to speak of. As the chirping of crickets echoes through a wooded hillside, Dominic Moore and eight other Rangers stand silent in a clearing. Then a whistle blows and the tranquillity ends. In the darkness, Moore's posse begins to push a camouflage-color Hummer 437 yards up a 45° incline. It's a gauntlet through which several hundred Army cadets have passed over the past four years, but at the moment it's part of an NHL training camp.

Call it team building, courtesy of first-year Rangers head coach Tom Renney. Cursing in a mélange of English, Czech, Russian and Swedish, Moore and his pals push the four-ton vehicle up the hill as though it were little more than a Tonka toy. Not only is their time, 9 minutes 30 seconds, the best of five Rangers groups', it's the fastest ever at the Academy—by 30 minutes. "Warriors," says Point 1st Sgt. J.B. Spisso, who oversees the Hummer drill. "They just gutted it out."

Warriors? Guts? Sir, no, sir, these aren't your older brother's Rangers. If they were, after all, the team would still have an $80 million payroll and there wouldn't be room on the roster for a humpbusting nobody like Dominic Moore. If they were, the pricey vets making up that payroll wouldn't have gone for Renney's "Three Nights at the Point Makes for Great Team Chemistry" sales pitch. If they were, the Rangers—who haven't made the playoffs since 1997—would be in last place in the Atlantic Division rather than fighting for the top spot. And that, for a sport that needs every one of the Big Apple's hockey fans-not to mention its media outlets-would be very bad. Almost as bad as the Rangers were two years ago.

In that last season of your big bro's Blueshirts, Moore did everything he could to make the club, and it didn't matter. On Day 1 of 2003 training camp, Moore put Mark Messier on his keister, a snot-nosed 23-year-old center just out of Harvard upending a 42-year-old legend. Impressive, yes, but not enough-even with a strong camp-to earn a roster spot. With high-priced playmakers like Messier, Eric Lindros, Bobby Holik and Petr Nedved, New York needed another center like Janne Niinimaa needed another vowel. Moore was sent back to Hartford. "I never dwelled on not being called up again," he said last September. "I was better off getting regular time in Hartford than I would have been sitting on the Rangers."

Which he did, three weeks into the regular season, after Lindros hurt his left shoulder. And in his very first game, a 5-1 win at Montreal, Moore had three assists in just 7:38 of ice time, tying a 65-year-old team record by scoring three points in his debut. But a week later, Moore was back in Hartford. And if that weren't enough, four months later, the final season of your older brother's Rangers suddenly looked like it might be the final season of Moore's older brother Steve's NHL career.

Steve Moore, of course, is the former Avs center who had his neck fractured by Todd Bertuzzi in March 2004. He's also one of Dominic's two older brothers (Mark is the other). Growing up in suburban Toronto, the Moore boys were pretty much about two things: school (mom Anna was a teacher) and street hockey. Every day when the last bell rang, the boys rushed home to play for a couple hours until Anna had the nerve to call 'em in for dinner. After inhaling their chow, they'd go back outside and-this being a story about Canadians-play for a couple more hours until dad Jack, an amateur tennis champ, had the nerve to put 'em to bed. Sometimes the boys played one-on-oneon-one, with an empty net. Other times, one Moore tended goal while the two others mixed sticks. Sometimes Jack would join in, and they'd play two-on-two. But they always played together, even in college. As members of the 1999-2000 Crimson squad, the Moores became just the sixth brother trio to play on the same D1 hockey team. Mark, the oldest, was drafted by the Penguins in 1997, but three concussions in one week ended his career in 2003. Two years and another wounded sibling later, Dominic is the last Moore on ice. Thank his brothers.

"I was always small growing up," says the six-foot, 194-pound Dom, who in hockey gear looks very much like a boy in men's clothing. "The only way to compete with Mark and Steve was outhustling and outworking them." From Harvard to Hartford to New York, that relentless work ethic had always been his calling card. All he needed was somebody to take it. And a salary cap.

"I wanted to keep him here in 2003," says Renney, a fundamentals freak and former Team Canada coach who was a Rangers exec at the time. "But our franchise had a different philosophy."

Yeah, spend recklessly on pricey, aging vets who never panned out. But thanks to the lockout and Renney's promotion in July 2004, that philosophy changed. With Messier (retired), Lindros (lost to free agency), Nedved (traded) and Holik (bought out) gone-and with a plan to rebuild around Jaromir Jagr and a cast of hungry grinders (see below)-there was suddenly a place for Moore.

"Dom works extremely hard," says Rangers center Steve Rucchin. "We've got one of the best penalty-killing units because of his willingness to outwork the other team's power play." That helps explain why Moore, a fourth-line center who gets 13 minutes a night and has just six goals and four assists, has become a team leader. It also doesn't hurt that he does what's asked of him and smiles doing it: Moore recently started playing left wing for the first time in his life, part of Renney's attempt to spark the Rangers attack. "Dom takes pride in doing things correctly," says Renney, who clearly relishes the chance to talk about his unsung forward. "He may not have a 'C' on his jersey, but he provides leadership with his work habits on and off the ice."

Exhibit A: when Renney blows the opening whistle at a December practice, No. 18 is first in line for drills. Three hours later, he's last in the gym, sweating through onelegged jumps over thigh-high hurdles. In between, taking a breather in the players lounge, the hyperserious sociology major delivers his career thesis: "I'm a better player now than I was yesterday, and I'll be a better player tomorrow than I am today." Corny as it sounds, he's saying what's in his heart.

Such was not the case the prior evening, when Moore took a page from a Stonewall 101 text. After a tough home loss to Bertuzzi's Canucks, in which Moore didn't light the lamp or make an assist, he found himself dishing out clichés to a media mob. How much did this game mean to you? "Just another game," Moore says in a monotone. How did it feel to hit Bertuzzi? "It's not something I really thought about at all." Are you happy to have a five-day layoff? "I think it'll give the team a chance to regroup." Moore is just as careful when talking in private about the Bertuzzi's attack on Steve. But as his voice trails off tonight, his eyes well up, not so much from the loss but from the sting of nearly losing a brother. Although Steve is doing better-even mulling a return to the game-his mugging is a subject that does more than burn at Dom. It fuels his fire. "More than anybody," says Renney, "Dom understands the opportunity he's been afforded is fleeting."

Add in the lunch-bucket mentality and an Ivy League intellect-"We don't call him The Professor for nothing," Rucchin says-and it's no surprise that the former third-round pick has become New York's go-to guy on the PK. Moore is a good skater who makes great reads, crucial for penalty killers. "Dom has tremendous anticipation and peripheral vision," Renney says. "That's what allows our penalty kill to be effective."

Two years ago, the Rangers' 79.4% PK rate was second-worst in the NHL. This year, with Moore and fellow grinders Jed Ortmeyer and Blair Betts leading the way, their 86.9% clip is second-best. It doesn't hurt that rookie goalie Henrik Lundqvist has the NHL's third-best save percentage. Or that first-year right wing Petr Prucha had as many goals before Christmas (16) as Santa Claus and Sidney Crosby combined.

So, yeah, Jagr is once again at the top of the NHL scoring charts. But the surprise of the season, at least in New York, is that Moore and his band of hard-skating, puck-moving, Hummer-pushing newbies are driving this team. Without them, this year's Rangers would look a lot more like… well, just ask your older brother.

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