TARRYTOWN, N.Y. — There’s been a theme with the players the New York Rangers have pursued this offseason.They landed 25-year-old Pavel Dorofeyev in Friday’s trade with the Vegas Golden Knights, adding a much-needed goal scorer to a roster that’s struggled to generate consistent offense. It required three draft picks to get him, including this year’s No. 26 overall selection and a top-10 protected first-rounder in 2028, plus a generous seven-year, $77 million extension that was formally agreed to Tuesday.The Russian winger is ineligible for any trade protection until 2028-29, at which point a full no-movement clause will kick in and be modified to add a partial no-trade list for the final two years of the deal, according to a league source who spoke anonymously to share unannounced details of the contract.The Rangers see Dorofeyev as a franchise cornerstone at a time when president and general manager Chris Drury has been on the hunt for them.Pavel Dorofeyev scores twice to lead Vegas to victoryWe’ve reported on his interest in Bowen Byram, Mason McTavish and Brady Tkachuk — each of whom has been traded elsewhere in recent days — while Elliotte Friedman mentioned Carolina Hurricanes defenseman Alexander Nikishin as another target on Monday’s episode of “32 Thoughts.”What can we glean from that? All of those players are 26 or younger, highlighting Drury’s preference to acquire talent that can contribute for several years to come. The days of making long-term, short-sighted commitments to veterans with few prime seasons left appear to be wisely in the rearview mirror. (At least for now.)It’s not an easy objective, with many of those attempts falling short due to players’ preference to go to winning teams, New York’s limited assets not aligning with what trade partners are looking for, or a combination of both. But Drury was determined to make a splash and figured out a way to make it happen.How did it come together? It started with finding a situation that would allow him to leverage his considerable salary cap space against a team that was feeling the crunch. The Knights are sitting on just $4.625 million in available cap space, according to PuckPedia, and have prioritized re-signing unrestricted free agent defenseman Rasmus Andersson. There’s not even enough room to do that at the moment, let alone pay a restricted free agent such as Dorofeyev the kind of raise he’s earned by netting a total of 72 goals the last two seasons.Barring a trade that cleared substantial space, something had to give. Even if the Knights did that, the path to a deal was filled with obstacles. They weren’t willing to go anywhere near the $11 million average annual value the Rangers have on the table, leaving too wide a gap to bridge.