NEW YORK -- The last time Glen Sather coached in the NHL, the New York Rangers won the Stanley Cup.

	Petr Nedved (93) and the Rangers stumbled again on Thursday.

Don't expect it to happen again.

Sather, who hadn't been behind the bench since a second term with the Edmonton Oilers back in 1993-94, was in charge of the Rangers for their 4-3 overtime loss to the Colorado Avalanche on Thursday, taking over for Bryan Trottier, the coach he fired the day before.

"I don't see myself as a messiah," Sather said. "I just see myself as a man who knows the coaching role. I know the players, I know the personnel. I know the league."

Sather knows everything. If you don't believe it, just ask him.

Sather hired Trottier, who had no previous experience as an NHL head coach, in June.

It was a mistake, and everyone told Sather so. He just wouldn't listen.

The problem wasn't that Trottier is an Islanders' legend, who made his name as one of the greatest in the game playing for the Rangers' hated rivals.

The problem was that Trottier couldn't coach.

Sather fired him with 28 games left in his first season, pointing to a lack of discipline and accountability.

Pat Burns or Ken Hitchcock, running the New Jersey Devils and the Philadelphia Flyers at the top of the Atlantic Division, would have brought both. Either of them would have jumped at the chance to come.

Sather talked to both. But he was too impressed with the pages and pages and pages of handwritten answers on the take-home exam that Trottier handed in.

See, kids? Penmanship counts.

Sather has been living on the reputation he earned with one great team in Edmonton, using the edge he picked up coaching in the WHA to collect Wayne Gretzky and Mark Messier and build a team that won five Cups.

That was enough to put him in the Hall of Fame in 1997. But he hasn't done anything since.

Hockey economics broke up the Edmonton dynasty before its time. Sather shipped Gretzky to Los Angeles and Messier to New York, where he broke a 54-year hex and led the Rangers to that one miraculous Cup in 1994.

Sather stayed on there, a small-market hero battling the big-money monsters with his experience and his expertise.

Turns out his image was just a mirage.

"I really don't care about reputation," Sather sneered. "I care about winning and getting the organization to the playoffs."

When Sather jumped to the other side three years ago, he did exactly what the Rangers have always done.

He tried to outspend everybody.

He used the Rangers' limitless resources to snag Eric Lindros (but only because he blew his chance at Jaromir Jagr), then went after Pavel Bure. Last summer, he went shopping with a bagful of cash and landed Bobby Holik and Darius Kasparaitis as soon as the market opened.

But that's just what Neil Smith and so many others before him used to do.

Smith at least gave Rangers fans the Cup. Sather hasn't even gotten their team to the playoffs. And that's not going to change now.

Thursday night, Jim Dolan, the Cablevision scion who runs the team for his father's company, emerged from the pregame pep talk he gave the players and held court.

"I told them I believe in them," he said. "I told them there's more than enough skill and talent to make it into the playoffs. Not only make it in the playoffs, but to make it into the finals and to win the Stanley Cup."

"Glen's guaranteeing we're going to make the playoffs and I'm guaranteeing it, too."

That just isn't going to happen. But Dolan worships Sather, so Sather's job is safe beyond what happens behind the bench this season.

"As much as you guys would like to believe that Cablevision would give up on a man of the quality and character of Glen Sather, the answer is no," Dolan said.

Of course, Trottier had quality and character and they gave up on him in a New York minute.

Trottier had one moment this season, his triumphant return to Nassau Coliseum, when his new team slammed his old team and looked like it might turn around.

Then they collapsed, losing three in a row, including two to the Atlanta Trashers. Trottier and his team looked dazed and confused, and now he's gone.

Sather fired the coach. Dolan should have fired the guy who hired the coach.

Cablevision has made a mess of New York's sports. The Rangers and Knicks stink and the Yankees, the city's most important franchise, and Nets, the metropolitan area's rising stars, are kept off its cable systems and unavailable to a huge chunk of the market.

Dolan's company is stealing the thrill of victory, everywhere it touches.

And the worst part was the Rangers fans, the most passionate in the city, acting Thursday night like they didn't care.

"All we need is to be the team we saw at Nassau Coliseum the other night and we're going places," Dolan said last night.

They are going nowhere fast.

Thursday night, the Rangers scored two goals late in the third period to come from behind against Colorado. Then they gave up a goal even later and gave away another point they can't afford to lose.

Once, Glen Sather's teams won Stanley Cups.

Now, the Rangers will miss the playoffs for a sixth consecutive time.