Better late than never.
If the Islanders had snapped their losing streak a week ago, there would have been plenty of time to try to make a late charge into the playoffs. Instead, a whole lot of the weight lifted off their shoulders by beating the Wild 3-1 on Friday at UBS was overshadowed by the plain fact of the matter that their playoff chances look shot anyway.
“Obviously, we’re not in the position where we want to be in,” Noah Dobson said after a superb performance including 18:55 of ice, a power-play goal and an assist. “You know what, there’s lots of times last year where we thought we were down and out. It takes one game, a couple losses elsewhere and you’re back in it. That’s our mindset. Great game tonight, build on it.”
Technically speaking, it’s not over just yet.
The Islanders are five points back of Montreal and even on games played, with the Red Wings, Blue Jackets and Rangers also in front of them.
That would be Lloyd Christmas “So you’re saying there’s a chance” territory.
Enough for some rally-around-the-flag rhetoric after Friday’s win, not quite enough for it to come off as believable.
Playoffs or not, the Islanders have little choice but to try to end the season on a good note after the train wreck of the last two weeks hit a nadir with Anthony Duclair taking a personal leave of absence after coach Patrick Roy decimated his play Tuesday night.
On that note, Friday marked some progress, though by the end of the night, everyone was looking ahead to Sunday, when Alex Ovechkin will roll into Elmont looking to break the NHL’s all-time goals record after tying Wayne Gretzky’s 894 on Friday.
“We’re gonna focus on us,” Roy said when asked about Ovechkin. “I know it’s gonna be hard, but that’s what we have to do.”
With Max Tsyplakov back up on the second line and Matt Martin returning to the lineup for the first time since mid-January, the Islanders’ only option at this point is to try to play as simple a game as possible, get chances off the rush and defend hard.
There’s a ceiling with that, it’s not going to work every night, but it looked pretty effective on Friday against a Wild team that is struggling to the finish line while trying to lock up a playoff spot of its own.
After Mats Zuccarello put Minnesota ahead 1:42 into the second, the Islanders quickly struck back and controlled much of the game from there.
It took Casey Cizikas a mere 36 seconds to answer Zuccarello’s goal, tipping in a point shot from Dobson.
Just 1:44 later, Simon Holmstrom’s two-on-one feed to Alexander Romanov banked in off Frederick Gaudreau for a 2-1 lead.
And here’s one you haven’t heard much this season: The Islanders consolidated their lead on the power play.
Dobson’s one-time blast from just below the blue line 3:36 into the third extended the lead to 3-1 for the Islanders’ third power-play goal in four games.
“Played really well from the start to the end,” Roy said. “I thought that we had a lot of jump. We played really well defensively, we had good sticks, I thought our forecheck was good. Offensively, I thought we managed the puck well, did all those things.”
For Tsyplakov, whose puck management Roy has repeatedly stressed, it was an up-and-down night.
His turnover deep in the Islanders’ zone led straight to Zuccarello’s goal, with the former Ranger banking the puck off Ilya Sorokin’s mask and in.
A few minutes later, though, the Russian made up for it by feeding Holmstrom on the break and notching an assist.
“I love when he’s first on the puck and he holds onto it,” Roy said. “He used his body, protects that puck.”
As for Martin, he played a mostly unremarkable 7:49 on the fourth line, looking slow at times but rarely standing out for reasons good or bad.
Better late than never to snap the losing streak. Better late than never to find some traction at five-on-four.
With where the Islanders are right now, nobody is complaining about two points.
Sunday, and history, awaits.
