Isles get off to bad start to stretch run
This is a week that could make or break the Islanders’ season, with three straight games against division opponents who, like them, are stuck in the pack chasing a playoff spot. They opened with a dud. The Blue Jackets scored four unanswered goals to race past the Islanders, on the ice and in the standings, with a 4-1 win Tuesday at Barclays Center.
“It’s extremely frustrating,” left wing Anders Lee said. “We gotta find some kind of spark, some kind of life, some kind of energy. It’s gotta change. Just more of the same, it’s disappointing.”
Trailing 2-1 entering the third period, the Islanders (27-25-6) put some pressure on early with strong scoring chances by the Anthony Beauvillier-Mathew BarzalJordan Eberle line. But they were denied each time — and then the Blue Jackets (29-23-4) took over for good.
Columbus’ Brandon Dubinsky and Cam Atkinson both scored on Jaroslav Halak (47 saves) in a span of 43 seconds to sink the Islanders further into their rut, losing for the ninth time in their last 13 games.
“We have our meetings, we have our focuses and we come out and we’re dialed in before the game starts,” Lee said. “Then we’re coming in here at the end with the postgame, after basically another script of the same thing.”
The club hadn’t shied away from talking up how big a week this is — with games against the Rangers and Hurricanes still to come — but couldn’t match it with its play.
The crowd of 10,232 had been restless for most of the night, but after Atkinson’s goal — he beat Jason Chimera to the net to finish off a one-timer — and through the rest of the third period, they’d had enough. Chants of “Snow must go” grew louder, calling for the ouster of longtime general manager Garth Snow.
They may have been even angrier had they heard coach Doug Weight’s postgame comments, as he hoped for a better atmosphere against the Rangers on Thursday at Barclays.
“[We’ll] have a real exciting, hopefully, little more exciting building than it was today from the start, on Thursday,” Weight said.
For the second time in 10 days, the Islanders allowed the Blue Jackets to take 26 shots on goal in the first period. Halak stopped each of those Tuesday, but could not turn away all 51 by the end of the night.
“We need to play for 60 minutes, that’s the bottom line,” Halak said. “It comes down to execution, effort and playing with your heart.”
The Blue Jackets entered the game with the league’s worst power play (14 percent), but converted on two of their four chances on the man-advantage to build a 2-1 lead by the end of the second period.
John Tavares had given the Islanders a 1-0 lead near the end of an otherwise lifeless first period, marking the captain’s 600th career point in his 645th game. He became the sixth Islander to cross the threshold, joining Bryan Trottier, Mike Bossy, Denis Potvin, Clark Gillies and Brent Sutter.
But it served as little consolation for a team that was left searching for answers after another familiar result.
“Guys are emotional on the bench and they’re trying to get each other going, they just had nothing,” Weight said. “I don’t know.
“You have 24 games left, so there’s points out there. It doesn’t matter if you get the eight points now or the eight points later, but we need to get better and improve. Whether that means doing a couple different things or personnel or whatever, we have to figure it out.”