The Islanders begin a 6 game road
trip tonight in Toronto against the conference rival, Maple Leafs. Eric Hornick mentions that the Isles are 4-1-0 in last 5 trips to Toronto. They
will do it with Kyle Okposo, who flew up to Canada to meet his team mates for
tonight's game after missing yesterday’s game due to the birth of his daughter. The word on Evgeni Nabokov is that he will
miss at least a week and everyone knows the Isles wasted no time putting him on
injured reserve. That’s never a good sign
and is most likely, a re-injury of what kept him out from Nov. 18th thru December 12th. Per Kevin Schultz, Nabokov had a .924 SVP and one shutout in 10
games prior to getting hurt last night. 924Sv%.
Forwards: Vanek-Tavares-Nelson, Bailey-Nielsen-Okposo,
Grabner-Strome-Clutterbuck, Martin-Cizikas-Boulton.
D-Pairings: de Haan-Hamonic, MacDonald-Strait, Hickey-Carkner.
Kevin
Poulin will get the start with Anders Nilsson on the bench.
The
Isles went down quickly after a de Haan turnover, and a Toronto
redirection, 1-0 Leafs. After a few
shifts, Capuano was back to Vanek-Tavares-Okposo. Kevin Poulin recovered nicely after that and
played well for the remainder of the period.
Kyle Okposo (Tavares & Hamonic) beats Bernier late in the period to
tie the game at 1-1.
In the
second period, Frans Nielsen tries a home run pass to Grabner, but over shoots
his man. Michael Graner stays with it and makes Reimer pay after he moves to
misplay a puck out of the trapazoid, and goes around the net and tucks it in on
the far side, 2-1 Islanders. Leafs score
off weak clear by deHaan who is not having his best game, score tied at
2-2. Isles seem to be giving up the blue
line, then struggling to catch back up. They
are playing a sloppier and unpolished effort than last night. At least their PK has been good tonight going
3/4. Frankly, the Isles are fortunate to
be tied at this point.
Thanks to IslanderMania & @60CarltonSt for the screen capture.
The
Isles get a rare PP chance to start the third and Frans Nielsen (Vanek) makes
it count, 3-2 Isles with a PPG, which is 1/1.
That gives Thomas Vanek a 10 game point streak. Shortly after, Calvin de Haan (Hamonic) makes
no mistake here with a high shot from the top of the left circle and it goes
behind Reimer to give the Isles a 4-2 lead.
It is de Haan's first NHL goal.
He has settled down and resumed his solid play for the Isles on D,
especially on the first pairing. The
Isles D is playing well as a unit tonight.
The Maple Leafs score with just over 3:00 remaining off an odd bounce in
front of the net, 4-3 Isles. Reimer goes
to the bench with 1:13 remaining in the third period, empty net for
Toronto. Michael Grabner blocks a
Toronto shot, and clears the puck from the zone to Cal Clutterbuck and he gets
the empty net goal to seal the deal.
Islanders win, 5-3 on the road and gain 2 points, just 7 points out a
playoff spot.
The
Isles PK comes up big, going 4/5, and lead in take-aways 13-4. That was a big adjustment from the start of
the game. The shots on goal were 26-25
in favor of Toronto. Kevin Poulin made
some mistakes, but got it done when it mattered most, going 23/26 with a .885Sv%. And congratulations when it is due. Head Coach, Jack Capuano got his 100th career
win behind the Isles bench tonight.
It was
a clutch win and a character building moment for your New York Islanders
tonight. The more these moments happen for this team, the more real they become.
Let’s do this.
Isles Notes:
John Tavares named to
Canadian Olympic team; Thomas Vanek, Michael Grabner selected for Austria. Lubomir Visnovsky was named to the Slovakian
national team, although he isn’t expected to play.
Per Eric Hornick, “As
Butch bids adieu to Jiggs, Chris King is sharpening his skates. Howie mentioned
last night that Chris has games in Denver/Dallas.” I am looking forward to hearing Chris King on
the MSG T.V. Isles broadcast.
Back for More. All Islanders. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JhKNuoaGHO0 …
… … … … … … … … … … … #Isles
#believe
#STRONGisland @FFDP
No comments:
Post a Comment