This afternoon, your New York Islanders will face the St.
Louis Blues. The organization will honor Mr. Islander, Bob Nystrom. Nystrom said of the day's event, "It's moving and it will bring back some great memories".
Jaroslav Halak will not need any motivation to play his former team & show
them that they made a mistake in trading him last season. Another win
today would increase the franchise winning record that Halak now holds at 11
straight games. Ryan Pulock (13pts in 20 AHL games) may join Griffin
Reinhart on an Isles blue line that has had a rough few days after Johnny
Boychuk & Lubo Visnovsky were placed on IR. Travis Hamonic (upper
body) was also placed on the team's IR list retroactive to 12/2.
Ken Hitchcock on playing the Islanders, "They took
their lumps and allowed guys to grow. Now the rest of us are taking our lumps
from them."
Forwards: Kulemin-Tavares-Okposo,
Grabner-Nielsen-Grabovski, Lee-Nelson-Strome, Martin-Cizikas-Clutterbuck.
Defensive Pairings:
Leddy-Donovan, de Haan-Reinhart, Hickey-Strait.
Pulock skated in warm-ups as the 7th D & has been
scratched. He
has been back to Bridgeport. Staple says that means Visnovsky will most likely
be ready for Tuesday.
Jaroslav Halak is in net with Chad Johnson in the back up
role.
In the first period, the Lee, Nelson, Strome line opens play with
some solid pressure in the Blues' zone & Halak with a few good saves early in the game. The Islanders seem to be dialed in so far. Isles go to the PP, but fail to generate much
until their next one a few seconds later.
Frans Nielsen (Okposo & Nelson) scores his 6th of the season to give
the Isles a 1-0 lead. Isles
are back to the man advantage for third time in the last five minutes. Nothing doing that time. Jaroslav Halak takes a stinger off a
Tarasenko shot, but looks ok. Isles go to the PK. Halak
has been good, especially on that PK. Isles are doing some aggressive things on
defense & it's working so far.
Great save by Allen on Grabner's rebound shot. Isles capitalize on a Blues turnover & Ryan Strome comes off
the bench to make it 2-0 Islanders. Michael Grabner gets another big rebound,
but buries this one. 3-0
Islanders. Isles ahead, 12-10 in shots
and were 1/3 on the PP, 1/1 on the PK.
New York did a great job jumping all over the usually mistake free Blues
in that period. Lets see what happens
in the second.
The second period
begins with Martin Brodeur in the net for St. Louis to a chant of," Marty,
Marty, Marty," before he even faces a shot.
Isles back to the PK off an Ott dive & Stastny gets St. Louis on the board. 3-1 Isles. Berglund makes it 3-2 off a nice deflection
in front. Jack Capuano calls a timeout
to rally the troops. Blues are out
working & out shooting the Isles 6-0 to this point. Anders Lee lays out Gunnarsson trying to set
the tone for the second half. I don't think he went for the head as much as Gunnarsson
was low as he skated to the puck. Need
to keep your head up there. Isles back
to the PP, but fail to generate much.
deHaan called for holding & Isles to the PK again. Shattenkirk gets the equalizer on the
PP. 3-3 half way through the
second. The Islanders need to get back
to passing the puck and play a more disciplined, physical game. Isles somehow return to the PP as Donovan loses his edge. John Tavares scores on the PP to give the
Isles back the lead at 4-3 going into the second intermission. Isles
get lead back on iffy PP call. They need to regroup & refocus for the
third, playing a physical, but controlled game. They got away from what they did right in the first.
The Isles go to the
PK again after just a few minutes into the third period.
Thomas Hickey stands up Tarasenko, but Tarasenko follow through
hits Cizikas. Zeeker looks fine. Isles do a better job on the kill, but get tested against another kill soon afterwards. Oshie
ties the game on the Blues PP, 4-4. First
time Isles have allowed 3 PP goals in a game.
Isles need to do better job of clearing the puck man down. Casey Cizikas heads to dressing room. A scrum ensues to the left of Brodeur's net,
JT thinks the puck is in but the Official waves it off. After a review, no
goal. There was no conclusive video evidence to
refute the call on the ice. After, Halak is slow
on the lateral move and Stastny left alone in front of the net combine to a 5-4
St. Louis lead with under 6 minutes remaining.
Brian Strait has had a bad game today on defense. Tarasenko burns the Isles again on a bad
change to grab a 6-4 lead with less than 3 minutes remaining. Islanders look lost in the third period. Halak (34/40 with a .850 Sv%) goes to the
bench in the final minute to no avail.
The Isles were 2/5 on the PP and 2/5 on the PK.
Eric Hornick, "As Howie
just mentioned, Isles looking to do something they've never done - be 1st in
NHL to 20 wins." When the Isles
had a 3-0 lead after the first, that was a probable outcome. But after seeing them outshot 30-15 in the
second & third periods, it was obvious that would not happen. They needed to put more shots on
the oppositions net and create traffic in front to mount a real comeback. Brodeur ended up being good enough in relief
behind a resurgent Blues team that eventually woke up and turned the tables on
the Islanders. It was definitely one of
the worst loses of the season, especially because they surrendered a 3-0 lead, came back to force the tie, then gave up the lead again. It was a tough one to take, but perhaps another footnote in the
teams level of maturity. It was their poor defensive
play, lack of discipline and a scattered attack in the offensive zone spelled
doom for the Isles today.
There were a few scapegoats in the game, but
this was clearly a team loss. The Blues are a
good team that simply took it to the Islanders after being embarrassed in the
first period. The season is hardly in
jeopardy.
Rematch is on Thursday.
Isles Notes:
The Isles face the Wild @8pm on Tuesday, 12/9 in Minnesota.
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