Islanders’ push towards playoffs hits pace bump in loss to Lightning
TAMPA, Fla. — Simply because the playoffs started to look inevitable for the Islanders, there got here the group that twice prevented them from enjoying for a Stanley Cup.
A lot as each the Islanders and Lightning have modified over in an almost 24-month span, you continue to can think about members of the Isles uttering the identify like Seinfeld spitting out Newman’s: “Tampa!”
After a blowout 5-0 loss at Amalie Area on Saturday, the Islanders nonetheless haven’t crushed the Lightning since Recreation 6 of the 2021 NHL semifinals — a match that passed off at Nassau Coliseum, during which Anthony Beauvillier scored the extra time winner.
Good reminiscences and all, however with Tampa visiting UBS Area on Thursday to finish the season sequence, that may be a really perfect time to interrupt this six-game albatross.
The nadir of this one got here at 11:45 of the second interval when the Lightning compelled Lane Lambert into an motion so uncommon that it final occurred 370 days in the past: Pulling Ilya Sorokin from a sport. No prizes for guessing who it was in opposition to that point.
That exact concession to actuality (and to resting Sorokin to maintain open the potential for him beginning on Sunday at Carolina) got here amid a flurry of Lightning objectives, with Nikita Kucherov netting a breakaway aim and Steven Stamkos making it 4-0 inside two minutes.
Earlier within the second, Tanner Jeannot had deflected in a feed from Pierre-Edouard Bellemare after the Islanders misplaced him within the slot.
Sorokin left having stopped simply 17 of 21 photographs, however the goaltender was a sufferer of circumstance greater than something.
To pour it on much more, Brayden Level added a fifth aim for Tampa at 13:26 of the third, this one with Semyon Varlamov in nets for the Islanders.
The Islanders went via a veritable guidelines of how one can lose a hockey sport. They did not generate a forecheck.
They obtained pushed round — an excessive rarity for this group. Repeatedly, they allowed stretch passes to undergo the impartial zone and for a lot of the sport, they obtained compelled into enjoying chip-and-change hockey, solely on the again foot.
Tampa Bay started to place its fingerprints on the sport halfway via the primary interval, all of the sudden in fixed possession of the puck.
The Islanders couldn’t discover a strategy to escape of the defensive zone or acquire management of impartial ice.
That was by no means going to finish nicely and when Mikhail Sergachev’s shot from the left level banked off Romanov and previous Sorokin at 17:53 of the interval, the Islanders started to get their comeuppance.
The Islanders had sufficient of a cushion within the first wild-card spot to take care of a loss, even with the Panthers beating the Blue Jackets.
They did get assist with the Penguins shedding to the Bruins, so Pittsburgh stays three factors behind the Islanders with a sport in hand, whereas the Panthers have moved into the second wild-card spot, two factors behind the Isles.
Even amid a run of fine vibes for the Islanders, although, a loss like this snaps them again to actuality.
Locking up a playoff berth must be a formality at this level. However that doesn’t imply it is going to be simple.
Not with a sport in Raleigh on Sunday off a 23-hour turnaround, and never with a match in opposition to You-Know-Who again at house on Thursday.
The mixed rating between the Islanders and Lightning since Beauvillier closed the Coliseum: A cool 23-9.
You may guess in favor of who.
The most effective plan of action for the Islanders, then, is likely to be to win on Sunday.