PHILADELPHIA — A gong show, this was not.
Any notions that lingering tensions over Max Tsyplakov’s hit on Ryan Poehling two weeks ago might erupt Thursday, with the Russian facing the Flyers for the first time since, were put to bed pretty quickly.
Tsyplakov and Scott Laughton dropped gloves less than five minutes into the game, Tsyplakov lost his first career fight, and that was that.
Instead of being centered around the animosity that looked to be at a high point between these teams during their two recent matches at UBS Arena, the Islanders and Flyers turned in a muddy, sloppy game at Wells Fargo Center.
No matter, the Islanders will not be complaining after a 3-0 victory extended their winning streak to six in a row and resulted in them jumping the Flyers, Rangers and Canadiens in the Eastern Conference standings.
In their last game of the month, the Islanders also sealed their best points percentage in January since 1983 with a 9-3-0 record (.750), per team statistician Eric Hornick.
After a thoroughly entertaining pair of wins over Carolina and Colorado, it would be generous to put this one in the category of a grinding victory. Through the early stages, both teams pretty much just looked exhausted.
However droll it was to watch, though, the Islanders got the better of this particular war of attrition, taking a second-period lead before locking it down in the third.
Simon Holmstrom broke a scoreless draw at the 10:02 mark of the second, rattling a puck off iron and in for a second consecutive game.
Rookie winger Marc Gatcomb doubled the Islanders’ lead just over seven minutes later after the Flyers failed to pick him up on a line change, finishing Kyle MacLean’s breakaway feed for an easy first NHL point and goal.
On a night when Ilya Sorokin was near-unbeatable in the crease, two goals looked like it would be more than enough.
When Kyle Palmieri made it three, driving the net and beating Ivan Fedotov at four-on-four halfway through the third, it put a bow on the match.
The Flyers had gotten a puck by Sorokin early in the night, appearing to score on a Matvei Michkov power play shot. But Sorokin looked sure that he was interfered with, and after a challenge by coach Patrick Roy, video review confirmed that Morgan Frost had impeded his ability to make a play.
Sorokin, who has gone four straight starts with two or fewer goals allowed, ended up stopping 23 shots for his third shutout of the season.
This might count as the ugliest victory of the Islanders’ current streak, but it also may be one of the most important thus far.
For all the winning they’ve been doing this month, a move up the standings had yet to materialize for the Islanders. At least for the moment, it suddenly has — with a chance to make up a crucial two points on the Lightning on Saturday.
The standings are jam-packed right now, with just six points separating the wild-card leading Bruins from the 15th-place Penguins at the start of Thursday. What the Islanders do one day easily can be undone the next. There can be no letup now.
But they’ve come an awful long way from a month ago.
