It can always get worse. The Rangers found that out the hard way Wednesday night at the Garden.

The hottest team in the NHL met one of the coldest and the result followed the script, with the Bruins laying a 6-1 beatdown on the Rangers.

“It was probably one of the worst games of my career, one of the worst games I’ve ever been a part of in my Rangers career,” captain Ryan McDonagh said. “That pretty much sums it up.”

The time for sugarcoating is over.

The Blueshirts (25-24-5) lost their fourth straight game in regulation for the first time since Feb. 3-11, 2011. They have now dropped 10 of their past 13, sinking further into the slump that makes their sell-off seem more imminent by the day.

And after allowing four goals in the first 27:25, Henrik Lundqvist was pulled early for the third time in the past five games.

“It was disappointing, frustrating and embarrassing,” Lundqvist said.

The Rangers had won seven straight in this series between Original Six foes before Wednesday. The Bruins (33-11-8), who were playing the second night of a back-to-back but hardly looked the part, captured their first win over the Blueshirts since Nov. 27, 2015.

Coach Alain Vigneault repeated before the game his feeling that the Rangers have been playing better than their record would indicate, but his team failed to back him up on this night.

“It’s been brutal, no question about it,” McDonagh said. “With everything going on with the team, we need to stay focused on trying to put together somewhat of a complete game. We’re not even close.”

In what could be his final weeks as a Ranger, Rick Nash provided an early 1-0 lead, but less than three minutes later it was gone for good. A turnover from Brendan Smith created a three-on-one rush for the Bruins, and while Lundqvist made the save on the original shot, he couldn’t shut down the rebound, as Riley Nash found the equalizer in a wide-open net.

The Rangers had their share of good chances to take the lead back, but were robbed each time by Bruins goalie Anton Khudobin. The backup, filling in for Tuukka Rask on the second night of a back-to-back, stonewalled point-blank shots from Nash and Mika Zibanejad, and later got some help from the pipe to deny Steven Kampfer a goal.

Instead, it was Bruins captain Zdeno Chara who scored before the end of the period for the 2-1 lead.

“Those first two goals in the first had a negative effect on my play, knowing how hard it is for us right now to score goals and get going,” Lundqvist said. “I think that’s the key for us right now, not to overreact when bad things happen. But it’s hard when things have been going as bad as they have lately to stay the course and stay focused on the right things. Me personally, and as a team, we’re not even close in the second half of the game.”

The Bruins kept the pressure on in the second, doubling their lead in a span of 3:38. Patrice Bergeron’s knuckler from just inside the blue line trickled under Lundqvist’s right pad and soon after, Tim Schaller dangled through Tony DeAngelo and past Smith to make it 4-1 and end Lundqvist’s night.

“I thought we deserved better than being down by a goal [at the end of the first], but there’s no doubt that in the second period, that third and fourth goal, we just fell apart after that,” Vigneault said.

Ondrej Pavelec came on in relief, but he couldn’t stop the bleeding, allowing two more goals, one of them shorthanded.

“We stopped doing our jobs on the ice,” Vigneault said. “There’s no doubt that they made us look very bad tonight.”