SUNRISE, Fla. — It wasn’t so much a surprise as it was an affirmation.
When Marc Staal needed emergency ankle surgery on Nov. 9, the Rangers had the option of making someone else an alternate captain. That next game, on Nov. 10 against the Panthers at the Garden, there was the ‘A’ sewn to the sweater of Jacob Trouba.
“I guess I’m that guy,” Trouba said before his team wrapped up their two-game Florida swing against the Panthers on Saturday night.
The 25-year-old defenseman worked his way out of Winnipeg this offseason, and the Rangers traded a first-round pick (previously obtained from the Jets in the Kevin Hayes deadline deal) along with defenseman Neal Pionk to obtain the rights of the restricted free agent. The Blueshirts then signed him to a seven-year, $56 million deal. The $8 million annual salary-cap hit is the third highest on the team behind Artemi Panarin and Henrik Lundqvist.
With that money came responsibility, which Trouba is trying to shoulder as the youngest team in the league goes through some very turbulent ups and downs.
“Our team is having inconsistencies that I guess every team fights,” Trouba told The Post. “We’re trying to right that ship and know what we’re bringing every night, and that includes myself. We all go together. It’s not going to be two guys that play a really good game, then everybody else catches up. Everybody has to go as one.
“The games we’ve played well, everyone is going. If we don’t have everyone going, it doesn’t work. That’s the identity we’re trying to find and keep.”
It hasn’t been easy, and when Trouba went down with an upper-body injury midway through the second period on Thursday night at Tampa Bay, the team crumbled and was embarrassed with a 9-3 loss to the Lightning. Trouba shrugged off the injury and said he was ready to play on Saturday, but that game certainly was a wake-up call in a season when the Rangers have hit the snooze button more than once on those types of performances.
So if consistency is what the team is most longing for, then it could start with Trouba not only eating his team-high 22:38 of ice time per game, but doing it with fewer mistakes.
“One thing I love about Troubs, no matter what’s going on, he’s competitive,” coach David Quinn said. “He’s one guy you don’t want to go into the corner with. I thought he’s been playing better. He’s a guy that can eat minutes, kills penalties, on the power play. I think he’s had a good start.
“As with some of our guys, he’s had his ups and downs in the first [17] games. But he brings an awful lot to the table for us.”
Through his first six years in the league — all with Winnipeg, which took him with the ninth-overall pick in 2012 — Trouba has been known as an offensive defenseman. The Michigan native had his best statistical season a year ago, putting up eight goals and 50 points for a Jets team that was one of the best in the league.
So far this year, he has one goal and seven points through 17 games, in a very different context of the young Blueshirts. But he still tries to push for offense, especially aggressive pinching at the blue line, which can look bad when it results in an odd-man rush the other way.
“I’m OK [with it] if there’s a forward behind him,” Quinn said with a smile. “Those are reads — and not just him — I think our ‘D’ need to make better decisions when to get involved offensively.”
Trouba said that the change of scenery, to a young team in the Eastern Conference, still is “a learning process.” But he knows he’s going to be relied upon heavily, not just this season, but into the future as the Rangers hope this rebuild starts to take shape.
“It’s where I want to be, but I don’t know if I’m there yet,” Trouba said. “It’s an adjustment. But I do want to get there, for sure.”