IT'S OFFICIAL: GRETZKY IS A RANGER.(SPORTS)

Byline: KEN RAPPOPORT Associated Press

NEW YORK -- Wayne Gretzky is now the center of attention in New York.

The Great One officially joined the Rangers on Sunday, ending a free-agent odyssey of three weeks that had stretched from one end of the continent to the other.

``It's been a hard three weeks for me,'' Gretzky said after the Rangers announced at a press conference at Madison Square Garden that he had been signed to a two-year contract. ``So many teams were so nice to me and made some very lucrative offers. The hard part was, I could only choose one team.''

At the end, Gretzky was in a New York state of mind. He admitted a big factor …