LAS VEGAS — The Islanders are used to fist-pumping defeats, but this time was different.
This wasn't a blown lead or an overtime loss. This game was a close one all night long for the Islanders against the Stanley Cup champions. However, the Golden Knights got the knockout, and the Islanders couldn't convert enough opportunities and lost 5-2.
“We were good,” coach Lane Lambert said. “and [made] some mistakes. And it spun fast. I thought so, but if it lasted about 2 and a half or 3 minutes, it might have been the most solid match of this trip. ”
The Islanders played pretty much as expected for the first 37 minutes, which made the game difficult.
They fought for every puck. They made predictions hard and often. They skated with purpose and controlled the flow of play in one of the toughest buildings in the league to play on the road.
Still, the Islanders were unable to capitalize on their scoring opportunities and entered the third period still facing a 3-1 deficit as they watched Las Vegas take advantage of its own weak defensive structure.
At 17:11 of the second, Pavel Dorofeev broke the 1-1 deadlock with a backdoor tap-in off a Chandler Stevenson feed.
Just 90 seconds later, Nicolas Roy made it 3-1 with a wrist shot from the left circle, but Ilya Sorokin couldn't see it through a Keegan Kolesar screen, but the Islanders blocked the shot due to goaltender interference. I tried to play and lost.
“I could see his feet in the blue paint and Elijah's mask on his body,” Lambert said. “It was the right decision for us to go for it.”
Just a few minutes earlier, Anders Lee had hit the post on a 2-on-1 chance. And a few minutes earlier, Kyle Palmieri, who broke in alone off a stretch pass from Samuel Bolduc, was stoned by Logan Thompson.
Needing a comeback in the third set, the Islanders instead folded like they were playing poker a few blocks away.
Jack Eichel scored his second goal of the night on a power play just 31 seconds into the period to make it 4-1, capitalizing on a bench minor after a fateful challenge was deferred.
This was a quick and easy take on the Isles' chance to convert the game into two points.
The Isles fought back, too, with Matt Martin diving in on a rebound from Casey Cizikas to make it 4-2 just minutes after Eichel scored.
However, following a Matt Barzal turnover, Roy's wrist shot from the bottom of the left circle went past Sorokin and restored the lead to three points five minutes before the end of the period.
That was where it stayed.
Thompson, who made 28 saves, was great all night and outscored Sorokin in a game that probably favored the Islanders.
“The D-zone, the turnovers are probably hurting us,” Barzal said. “Tonight is mine. Their first goal was just what came from there. That's what it comes down to. We've got to get the puck out. Obviously we didn't get that and in the end. had to make sacrifices.”
At 6:25 into the game, Jack Eichel took advantage of a gap in the defense and hit a free one-timer shot to take the lead.
But Matt Barzal banked the puck from Thompson and scored from a sharp angle at 11:13, sending the Islanders into the first intermission to tie the game, and the goal was confirmed on review minutes later.
The night Thompson wore the Islanders' number, it was the highest the scoreboard had ever seen.
It also left a bad taste in the mouths of the Islanders, who returned home with a record of 1 win, 2 losses, and 1 loss in the four games that started in Pittsburgh and ended in the desert.
With the exception of an overtime loss to Colorado, the Isles didn't play terribly, but they did drop to a tie for third place with the Flyers in the Metropolitan Division with a point.
They had a chance and you can legitimately say they played their way. But with Semyon Varlamov injured in Denver, this trip was a terrible start to the new year.
