Stumbling to the finish
‘Tanks are a little low’ as Islanders’ slide hits five
Another day, another loss. After the Hurricanes took down the Islanders 5-2 on Sunday, it’s five straight defeats for the Isles, who look tired, disinterested and ready for the season to end. Lucky for them, they won’t have to wait long, though after slipping to 35-34-10, the dignity of a record above NHL-.500 is in some danger with three games remaining.
Where Thursday’s loss to the Rangers was an abject embarrassment, and Saturday’s loss to Buffalo looked like the product of exhaustion, Sunday’s game merely seemed to pass the Islanders by. The crowd was light and disinterested. So too, for some stretches, was the home team.
“We battled hard, they battled hard and the number of games that we have, I will say the tanks are a little low at times,” Islanders coach Barry Trotz said.
After going into the final period tied at two, Max Domi broke the deadlock with 14:20 to go, scoring with a free look off Teuvo Teravainen’s feed from behind the Islanders net.
The Islanders would have their chances to tie it up — particularly a power play at 8:50 of the period, plus a bit of time at sixon-five — but an empty-netter for Jesper Fast at 17:53 sealed the win for Carolina. Before the final horn sounded, Brendan Smith had added a second empty-netter to make it 5-2, and offer a final confirmation to any fan still in their seat that now was the time to leave.
“The third period, I thought they raised their game a little bit,” Trotz said. “Our game didn’t have the pop that it did in the first two periods. That’s a combination of us and a combination of them, probably.”
The Islanders (or at least Islanders fans) can at least take a shred of solace in knowing that their loss hurts the Rangers. Carolina came into the day two points ahead of the Blueshirts in the Metropolitan Division and with the tiebreaker in hand, meaning that to win the division, the Rangers need them to drop points in at least two games this week.
That wasn’t going to happen on Sunday.
With just two home games left at UBS Arena and the Islanders’ last home win coming on April 12, though, you do have to wonder if Maxine Nightingale has been played here for the last time this season.
The Islanders have been the team on the other side of Sunday’s game before.
The one going into a late-season game knowing they have a postseason berth locked up, while their opponents are playing out the string, trying to find silver linings.
“I don’t think the confidence has been chipped at,”
Matt Martin said following the 5-2 loss to Carolina. “Obviously, we’re disappointed, and we had higher expectations for ourselves than what we represented this season. We know it’s been disappointing. We gotta wear that.”
Martin, with three games to go in a season in which things have been doomed from the start, was ready to ruminate a bit on the bigger picture for the Islanders. He still believes the group in their locker room is capable of big things.
But where the Islanders found themselves finding ways to win games over the previous two seasons, they’ve found ways to do the opposite this season.
Take Sunday as an example. The Islanders came out with some jump, but went down a goal after a mindless turnover by Noah Dobson that sapped their momentum. Later, after Max Domi put the Hurricanes up 3-2 in the third, the Isles failed to generate any serious chances on a power play.
“It’s such a fine line, winning and losing in this league,” Martin said. “We just gotta get back to finding ways to pull those games out.”
As for the difference between then and now?
“In this league, you’re not gonna have your best every single night, but you need to still pull out wins, and win hockey games,” Martin said. “I don’t think we did that enough this season, where when we didn’t have our best game, we didn’t just keep it simple, find a way. We kinda got away from what we do best. That’s when the games kinda got ugly.”
➤ Anthony Beauvillier (upper body) and JeanGabriel Pageau (COVID-19) each missed their third consecutive game.
➤ The Islanders held a pregame moment of silence for Canadiens legend Guy LaFleur, who died Friday.
Casey Cizikas recorded his 200th career point with a secondary assist on Ross Johnston’s goal.