Islanders get outplayed but capitalize on limited chances to blank Capitals

WASHINGTON — Turns out, there’s such a thing as a blowout in which the winning team struggles.

The shot attempts will tell you that the Islanders were outplayed by the Capitals on Thursday.

So, too, will the eye test, with the advanced stats right behind.

That would make just about everything except the scoreboard, on which the Islanders thrashed Washington, 3-0.

“It was weird,” Noah Dobson told The Post.

That might have been underselling it.

The Islanders’ chances came few and far between.

They did not forecheck enough.

They rarely got on the cycle.

Their star defenseman, Adam Pelech, got hurt in the first period.

They scored on three of the first five shots they took, the fifth of which came after the game reached its halfway mark.

There was little to be excited about, aside from Semyon Varlamov earning his second shutout in three starts and that minor matter of the final score.

“I’m pretty happy,” the goaltender said. “I can’t believe it. I’m feeling good in the net right now.”

Just how strange was this victory? The Islanders put up two shots on goal in the opening 20 minutes and went into the first intermission with a 2-0 lead.

The first of those shots came just 22 seconds into the evening, when Ryan Pulock loosed one from the midpoint that made its way through traffic before settling in the back of Washington’s net.

Ten minutes later, Simon Holmstrom juked his way around John Carlson to set off a breakaway, got the puck back from Hudson Fasching and deposited it for a 2-0 lead.

When Caps goaltender Darcy Kuemper recorded his first save of the night — which only happened 15 minutes of game time after Holmstrom’s goal — it was greeted by a Bronx cheer.

Kuemper’s momentum, if you can call it that, was short-lived.

Brock Nelson scored to make it 3-0 at 11:15 of the second, converting easily on a breakaway to essentially salt the game.

In between, the Islanders were constantly in their own zone and the Capitals were constantly failing to convert chances.

Washington finished the night with 32 shots on net and 26 that missed the net.

Twenty-six more were blocked.

“I thought we had pretty good sticks for the most part in the D-zone,” Dobson said. “Guys had a lot of blocked shots which is a positive. You never want to spend that much time in your own end but when we were there, for the most part, guys beared down and got the job done.”

It looked as though the Caps had gotten a consolation goal at 9:01 of the third, but Lane Lambert’s challenge for goaltender interference proved successful.

This was not a game to placate the underlying worries about the Islanders.

They are still spending a little too much time in their own zone and leaning a little too hard on their goaltenders for comfort, though Varlamov was up to the challenge.

“We weren’t great for sure,” Pulock said. “It was kind of sloppy. … The important thing is we stuck with it.”

Pelech going off in the first period with an injury, not to return, does not help either.

The Islanders were meant to be getting their full defense corps back with Scott Mayfield returning Thursday.

That lasted less than a period and the Isles are now without half of their top pair.

It’s a rare thing to feel conflicted about a win. It’s even more rare to struggle for much of the night and have your most lopsided win of the season.

Of course, that is a whole lot preferable to struggling and being on the wrong end of such a scoreline.

And no matter how well the Islanders played on Thursday, no one is complaining about a 5-2-2 record.

“Big two points,” Dobson said. “And I’ll take it.”

That, at least, is good enough to leave the worries for another day.

That lasted less than a period and the Isles are now without half of their top pair.

It’s a rare thing to feel conflicted about a win.

It’s even more rare to struggle for much of the night and have your most lopsided win of the season.

Of course, that is a whole lot preferable to struggling and being on the wrong end of such a scoreline.

And no matter how well the Islanders played on Thursday, no one is complaining about a 5-2-2 record.

That, at least, is good enough to leave the worries for another day.