CHICAGO — Just like the injured Islanders, here are the healthier Islanders.
It's never simple, it's never easy, and there's always disappointment around the corner.
If anyone thought Sunday was a chance for the Islanders to write the first chapter of a turnaround for the season with Matt Barzal and Adam Pelech back in the lineup, and a chance to get over NHL .500 and earn a playoff berth. , all those aspirations were “splattered” onto the ice at the United Center as their opponents were last in the league.
Instead, the Islanders put in a disjointed, disjointed performance, with the players who were still missing, namely Bo Horvat and Anthony Duclair, outshining those who returned, as Connor Bedard's late winner led the Blackhawks lost 5-3.
Regardless of the health of the batting lineup, the Islanders will be troubled by not being able to sweep this home-and-home game, which looked like a great opportunity.
When we lost in this building last year, the head coach was fired the next day.
Patrick Roy isn't in such danger, but his inability to put together a game with enough consistency or cohesion to help his team rack up points even on a light schedule means he didn't have to play as well as he did last January. It shows that the problems when he was appointed to the position extended far beyond the head coach. Many of them have not been fixed yet.
The overarching themes of the game were the Islanders' inability to connect passes and their disorganized defensive zone structure.
It didn't help Barzal, who still looked like he was working on things early, missing passes outside the offensive zone at least four times in the first 20 minutes.
But he wasn't the only culprit. This was a team effort in every sense of the word.
Still, Teuvo Teravainen's 5-on-3 opening goal looked like a 3-2 deficit going into the third period.
In fact, Noah Dobson cut into the slot and burst through traffic to tie the game just 47 seconds into the third period.
The Islanders had trouble completing passes and getting into good position early, but those problems suddenly disappeared in the final 20 minutes.
The forecheck suddenly sounded and the Isles dominated the ball while looking for a winner.
But what they couldn't do was score.
And when the Blackhawks finally had a Grade A chance with 54 seconds left in regulation, they made the Islanders pay.
Connor Bedard took a shot at a loose puck, but the shot went through the legs of Ilya Sorokin, and the goalie lost sight of the puck as it crossed the line in slow motion.
Even for a team that specializes in crushing defeats, this team had some extra spark, and Connor Murthy's empty-netter sealed the deal.
Chicago took a 1-0 lead 9:08 into the game, taking advantage of the Islanders' struggles in the defensive zone when an uncovered Ilya Mikheyev converted a feed from Teravainen low.
The Islanders tied the score at 18:43 when Ryan Pulock broke through traffic and made a point shot, but less than a minute later he wasted a chance to tie the game and go into the locker room, throwing Taylor Hall I lost track of him and watched him score with 20 seconds left. He remained in the first period.
Simon Holmstrom, who won the puck battle and scored Purock's goal, entered the game 2:25 into the second game and converted a feed from Pierre Engvall at the crease.
It looked like the Islanders would extend their lead when Hall stumbled at 13:02, but back-to-back penalties by the Islanders put Chicago in a 5-on-3 situation, which Teravainen quickly converted.
Combine Sunday's structural problems with the chaos of the final 10 minutes Thursday night against the same team, and suddenly it looks like a concern.
Instead of turning the season around, the same contradictions remained.
