As much as they’ve struggled lately, the opportunity was there for the Rangers to climb into a playoff spot late Friday night.

By the time they faced off against the Anaheim Ducks, they knew that Montreal had already lost – for the fifth straight time – and a victory would lift them over the Canadiens and Columbus Blue Jackets and into the Eastern Conference’s second wild card spot.

All they had to do was beat a Ducks team filled with Rangers castoffs, featuring ex-captain Jacob Trouba and former teammates Ryan Strome and Frank Vatrano. Instead, against a team that isn’t going anywhere near the playoffs, the Rangers came up small yet again, blowing a late two-goal lead in the third period, before losing, 5-4, in overtime.

And what does a loss like that do to their playoff hopes?

Well, to quote the great Jim Mora: “Playoffs? You kidding me? Playoffs?’’

OK, that’s not entirely fair. Technically, the point they “earned’’ Friday night pulled them into a three-way tie with Columbus and Montreal for the final playoff spot in the East, although, since they had two fewer games remaining than Columbus (who played Saturday) and one fewer than Montreal (who play next on Sunday), they are still very much on the outside looking in.

And the way Montreal (0-3-2 in its last five) and Columbus (2-6 in its last eight, before Saturday) have been playing, we can’t quite write the Rangers (1-4-1 in their last five, entering Saturday) off just yet. They finished their California trip with Saturday’s late game against the San Jose Sharks, the worst team in the league. If they won, and if Columbus happened to lose to Ottawa, then the Rangers would actually be in a playoff spot Sunday morning.

Still …

That loss to Anaheim makes it crystal clear that the Rangers, Presidents’ Trophy winners last year as the best team in the regular season, are just not a good team. Adam Fox said so himself in the postgame locker room Friday night.

“Good teams do not lose a game like that,’’ the Jericho native said.

“In the third (period) we had, what, four power plays? Five power plays? Just, yeah, that can't happen.’’

The Rangers held a 3-1 lead going into the third period before Leo Carlsson, the 20-year-old from Sweden who was the No. 2 overall pick in the 2023 draft, scored at 2:22 to cut it to 3-2.

But then, Mika Zibanejad scored the Rangers’ first power-play goal in eight games to put the visitors up 4-2, at 4:35. And 21 seconds later, Anaheim’s Troy Terry got called for a tripping penalty. Twenty-four seconds after that, the Ducks got called for too many men on the ice, giving the Rangers a 5-on-3 advantage for a minute and 36 seconds.

They should have put the game away right then and there.

But they didn’t even get a shot on goal.

One attempt by Artemi Panarin was blocked. The next two by him were wide. After the first penalty expired, a J.T. Miller shot was blocked, a Fox shot was wide, and a Vincent Trocheck shot was blocked.

The Rangers would get two more power plays after that, but couldn’t score. They were 1-for-7 with the man advantage, and are 1-for-20 in their last eight games, and 2-for-35 in their last 13.

Goals by Cutter Gauthier, at 14:12, and Olen Zellweger, at 18:15, just after a Rangers power play expired, forced overtime, and Mason McTavish’s goal 59 seconds into OT won it for Anaheim.

“Power plays, for me, is a big thing, that we can’t close a game,’’ a disgusted-sounding Zibanejad said afterward. “We should have been able to close a game with the chances that we had, and chances that we got on the power play. And we didn't.’’

The Rangers have eight games left after Saturday, and they remain in the hunt for a playoff spot. The teams they’re battling with – Montreal, Columbus, the Islanders, Detroit – will all lose games along the way, so the Rangers absolutely still have a chance to emerge from the pack and grab the last wild card spot, if they can come through and win some big games over these next two-and-a-half weeks.

But after Friday’s loss; after that awful, no-show against Calgary on the last homestand; after all the bad losses they had before that, and considering the fact that they haven’t won three games in a row since November, what evidence is there to suggest they’ll be able to do that?