Weekend Lookback: Boston & Buffalo

Your New York Islanders met the Bruins in Boston and the Sabres in Buffalo this weekend. They fought hard, but lost to Boston by a 2-1 score and held on to get a 3-2 win against a struggling Buffalo team to end their latest road trip with a 2 & 1 record.  Details below.

Vs. Boston:

Forwards:  Lee-Tavares-Bailey, Grabovski-Nielsen-Strome, Grabner-Nelson-Kulemin, Martin-Cizikas-Clutterbuck.

Defensive Pairings:  de Haan-Hamonic, Leddy-Boychuk, Hickey-Strait.

Chad Johnson gets the start with Jaro Halak backing up.

Calvin de Haan played in his 100^th NHL game.

The Isles looked to get one back against Tuukka Rask & the Bruins on Saturday and put up a good fight, but Rask had their number again, making 39 saves en route to a 2-1 Boston win.  Chad Johnson played a good game for Islanders, making 34 saves and posting a .944Sv%.  Hopefully, he can build on the effort and climb back to his successes from earlier in the year.  The Isles came out fast & played tough, but were out-muscled by the Bruins for much of the game.  Even Ryan Strome dropped the gloves with Torey Krug (1^st NHL fight) early in the first period and New York responded when John Tavares (Neilsen & Hamonic) broke Boston’s streak of 16 straight PK’s with a PPG, good enough for a 1-0 lead.  Patrice Bergeron would tie the game a few minutes later on the PP after a weak hooking call was assessed against Ryan Strome.  The tie remained until late in the third period when Nick Leddy failed to clear the puck & Louie Eriksson handled Matt Martin to give the Bruins a 2-1 lead that would be the final score in the game.  The Isles were dominated in face offs (41-23) and were a dismal 1/4 on the PP.  They finished 1/3 on the PK for the night.  It should be noted that their defensive efforts and PK play were improved over the last several games, but not good enough to get the win.  Tuukka Rask was the difference maker in the game.

Lubo Visnovsky was scratched again along with Matt Donovan on defense for Brian Strait.  Coach Capuano told Visnovsky Strait would be rotation in to help the Isles on the PK, but Lubo wasn’t happy for missing his second straight game while healthy.  Per Arthur Staple, "I miss a lot of games, this year too," Visnovsky said after doing some extra work on the ice Saturday morning. "I have two concussions last year, this year my back is a problem . . . It's OK. Coach tells me they want to make a change, I try to stay positive and wait for my chance."  Viz added, "He tell me Straiter helps the PK, so I understand," Visnovsky said. "I want the team to keep winning and winning. I think I will help the team." 

 

Cal Clutterbuck & Michael Grabner would leave the game with injuries and not return.  Clutterbuck left the game after a hard hit against Krug.  He had gone into the locker room and returned earlier in the contest. I wonder if he finally reinjured himself on that hit.  Grabner looked good again & really appeared to be finding his stride.

 

Vs. Buffalo:

 

Fran's Nielsen played in his 500th NHL game.  He is the 24^th Isles player to do so.

 

Changes to the lineup:  Colin McDonald and Harry Zolnierczyk (wearing #16 in his Isles debut) are in for Cal Clutterbuck and Michael Grabner (IR retro thru 2/7). Lubomir Visnovsky in for Calvin de Haan, who took a skate to the face in the game against Boston.  These types of injury call ups are a prime example as to why Snow doesn't want to trade depth prospects now that he feels Isles are a contender.

 

Forwards:  Lee-Tavares-Bailey, Grabovski-Nielsen-Strome, Zolnierczyk-Nelson-Kulemin, Martin-Cizikas-McDonald

Defensive pairings:  Leddy-Boychuk, Strait-Hamonic, Hickey-Visnovsky.

Jaroslav Halak is in net with Chad Johnson backing up.

The Islanders wanted some payback against the Sabres as well, having lost a S.O. by the score of 4-3 that they had once led 3-0, back in December.  They start the game with a physical edge and control much of the play.  Colin McDonald fit in well with Martin & Cizikas and gets the Isles on the board for a 1-0 lead in the first period.  Anders Lee (Hamonic & Turgeon) channels Pierre Turgeon, pulls the puck from behind the net and scores a PPG halfway through the 2^nd period to increase the Isles lead to 2-0.  Its Lee’s 16^th of the season, putting him only one goal behind Forsberg/Hoffman for the rookie lead in scoring.  Mikhail Grabovski (Hamonic & Nielsen) rips one past Neuvirth from the slot to make it 3-0 Isles.  That’s 3 goals in 7 games since Garbovski has returned from injury. 

Ted Nolan called a timeout to settle things down and it turned out to be a good call.  Foligno converts a Visnovsky turnover to make it 3-1 Islanders.  A few minutes after that, Stafford makes it a 3-2 game.  The latter part of the second period was inexcusable for the Islanders who gave the Sabres all the breaks that they needed.  The third period was more of the Islanders wasting opportunities and taking needless penalties to try and keep Buffalo in the game.  But when time expired, they held on to win 3-2 & resume first in the Metro at 69 points.  They outshot the Sabres 31-10 in the game and went 1/2 on the PP and 3/3 on the PK.  Overall, it was a pretty good effort and a good platform to learn from & build on. 

"That's what happens when you start playing stupid." -- Casey Cizikas

 

Isles reach the 34 win mark on 2/8, which matches their total from all of last season.  They need to keep this going into next week against the Oilers, Leafs & Blue Jackets.

 

 

There were a few players who had big games for the Islanders this weekend, but Anders Lee & Casey Cizikas were the two players who stood out for me.

 

In my opinion, the Islanders still need to fine tune their defensive game & lower the amount of shots against per game, but the biggest thing is that their special teams need to improve and operate more consistently.  Their PP has let them down for most of the season and the amount of penalties that they have taken, coupled with an out of sync PK, has hurt them a lot lately.  Under Garth Snow’s current ideology, the challenges the Isles face when dealing with the inevitable player performance slumps and unexpected injuries need to be compensated with organizational depth & efficient coaching. The teams overall on-ice management needs to improve, particularly on Special teams.

 

Trade scenarios are complicated. We would all like to see a quick, reliable answer for things like a winger on the first line, but that isn’t easily accomplished with the existing trade market for what would be considered viable, well-fitting targets.  A team’s immediate roster need, although relevant, can’t always be pulled off without losing what the GM might see as major pieces of their carefully constructed future depth. We have learned over the last few years that Garth Snow doesn’t panic or make reactionary moves.  He certainly doesn't deviate from his plan, despite panic or mockery from fans & media. Especially now that his plan is yielding results, fans have less of a chance to see the team make the big moves.  Snow will endure challenges like Kyle Okposo's multi-week absence and try different guys on the 1^st line wing until fans foam at mouth for a trade. The only feasible scenario might be an attractive, well fitting & low cost, cap move just prior to the trade deadline.  There is no way he moves players like Lee, Strome or Nelson for something like this. They are too central to The Islanders future strategy.