The Rangers will celebrate 100 years as a franchise this upcoming season, and someone who has been around for so much of it is set to chronicle it all.
Dave Maloney was announced as the new TV analyst for the Blueshirts broadcast coverage on Wednesday, replacing Joe Micheletti and joining Sam Rosen’s play-by-play successor, Kenny Albert, in the MSG Networks booth for the upcoming 2025-26 season.
“I just couldn’t be more thrilled, in all honesty,” an excited Maloney said on a conference call with reporters Wednesday morning. “To be in this position, I’m really looking forward to it. And again, you mention the 100-year anniversary, it’s just a little overwhelming, but I’m really looking forward to it. It should be fun.
“I’ve never held it against Kenny Albert that he grew up as a Vancouver Canucks fan. We’ve worked together for 20 years and it’s funny, when we were signing off on the radio, it wasn’t like we were an old divorced couple or something like that. We were actually getting along! To think that we were going our separate ways and here we are. It’s great, it’s great all the way around.”
Dave Maloney has been named the new Rangers TV game analyst for MSG.
The first time Maloney dabbled in the media side of the game was during the 1981 playoffs, when he was in his seventh season with the Rangers and suffered an injury to his right knee in the first-round series against the Kings.
He joined Marv Albert and Sal Messina in the radio booth as the third voice.
Marv’s son, Kenny, was just a kid at the time, sitting in the corner keeping stats. Now joining Kenny in the booth as broadcast partners, Maloney considers it to be an incredible full-circle moment.
“That really then piqued my interest,” the 68-year-old Maloney recalled of his first experience calling an NHL game. “I will say, my good pal and teammate Ron Greschner, as we’ve kept in touch over the years, as he said to me, ‘I have no surprise that you’re in this business because you could never shut up as a player.’”
To Maloney, broadcasting is as close as you can get to the game without actually playing the game. And as someone who dedicated 11 years of his life to playing in the NHL, almost all with the Rangers, Maloney’s devotion to the sport radiates off of him.
A defenseman drafted 14th overall by the Rangers in 1974, Maloney went on to play parts of 11 seasons with the club from 1974-75 to 1984-85.
Dave Maloney is the youngest captain in Rangers history.
The Blueshirts made Maloney the youngest captain in franchise history at 22 years old — a distinction he still holds to this day — on Oct. 11, 1978.
In his first season donning the ‘C,’ Maloney not only helped the Rangers reach the 1979 Stanley Cup Final, but he also took part in one of the most memorable moments in club history when he joined Phil Esposito, Ron Duguay and Anders Hedberg in a Sasson Jeans commercial.
Maloney collected 70 goals and 225 assists over 605 games with the Rangers, earning the Most Valuable Player award in 1976-77.
The Rangers ultimately traded Maloney to Buffalo in December of 1984, but the Kitchener, Ontario native only played 52 games for the Sabres before announcing his retirement in 1985.
Maloney landed several broadcasting gigs after hanging up the skates, including CTV in Canada, the Minnesota North Stars, Sports Channel and Fox.
His first season as MSG Networks’ radio analyst for the Rangers came in 2005-06.
“One of the biggest things I’ve learned is that my passion for this particular franchise is pretty deep,” he said. “Learning along the way to express myself as an analyst and not a critic has been important. To be able to observe and not opine and not make it personal. And then, I’ve never forgotten how hard the game is… As players, we all get better the further we get away from the ice surface.
“So when you get up top, it looks so easy, right? It looks like probably how it looks for [Wayne] Gretzky or [Connor] McDavid or [Sidney] Crosby. But I think it’s important to remember just how hard the game is.”
Maloney has adored his time in radio, but he is looking forward to what he believes will be a seamless transition to a full-time spot in TV. Between his familiarity and comfort with Albert, as well as his history with the whole MSG crew, Maloney’s excitement is palpable.
Dave Maloney during the Winter Classic alumni game on Dec. 31, 2011.
Once he heard from Micheletti that he was moving on, Maloney immediately expressed his interest in the role and threw his hat in the ring.
When you listen to how Maloney talks about the Rangers, it’s apparent why. His investment in the team is incomparable, while his knowledge of the game and love for the sport is indisputable.
“I think we can all agree there had to be a change,” Maloney said when asked about the current state of the Rangers. “I think it starts behind the bench. Nothing against Peter [Laviolette], but I think it’s an asset that both Mike Sullivan and David Quinn have had some experience in the New York market. It’s not an easy market to come into, given the circumstances, moving around and things like that. I had a great chat with both of them last week at the development camp. And again, last season was what it was, but it is what it is and you move on.
“I think Chris Drury and his staff were pretty aggressive in recognizing that maybe some changes had to be made and they did make [them]. [Vladislav] Gavrikov was deemed to be perhaps the top defenseman out there and it’s been a bit of a struggle in our own end. I did like [Urho] Vaakanainen and I did like [Will] Borgen, because I think they go about their business in a little quieter way, in a little safer way. And the Rangers needed that to have happened. That’s why I’m excited, I’m excited because you have arguably the top goaltender in the league who has carried the team, but I think being a little bit quieter in their own end will help…
“There’s a lot of things here that I think can cause one to say, ‘You know what, last year is done.’ There’s an awful lot of things to build off here and I’m really excited, really excited about that. Again, I think we all have our biases, right? And my bias is for this franchise and there’s a lot of reasons why. I just think that you look ahead and I think there’s a lot of reasons to be excited, I really do.”
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