Pat Pickens
Part of the reason for the New York Islanders hiring Pete DeBoer this late in the season was the potential new-coach bump.
Mission accomplished.
The Islanders peppered 24 first-period shot on the beleaguered Toronto Maple Leafs net and snapped their four-game losing skid with a 5-3 win at UBS Arena on Thursday.
The Isles win, coupled with the Philadelphia Flyers’ loss in Detroit and the Columbus Blue Jackets’ loss in Buffalo pushed them past Columbus and one point behind Philadelphia for the No. 3 seed in the Metropolitan Division.
New York outshot Toronto 44-16, and five different Islanders scored, keyed by Matthew Schaefer‘s 23rd which tied the NHL record for most goals by a rookie defenseman. Calum Ritchie earned the game’s No. 1 star by putting up a goal and an assist.
The Islanders Came Out Flying vs Toronto
The Islanders had 16 shots in their 4-3 loss to the Carolina Hurricanes on Saturday in their last game under Patrick Roy.
It took them 12:04 to record that number of shots against Artur Akhtyamov and the Maple Leafs on Thursday night.
In a must-win game, against an opponent that had already been eliminated from playoff contention, the Isles posted their most shots in a first period in 18 years. New York outshot Toronto 24-3 in the first period and scored the game’s first two goals, first when Brayden Schenn scored just 128 seconds in and J-G Pageau struck at 4:55.
“A lot of really good stuff,” DeBoer said. “We’ve been talking all week about playoff habits, and you have to have them this time of year to give yourself a chance to get in the playoffs, and I thought they delivered on that.”
The new-coach bump delivered the much-needed result. The Isles had 40 shots over their previous two games, losses to the Hurricanes and Flyers on Friday and Saturday, yet had 39 shot attempts in the first period and 60 over the first 40 minutes.
“I think we were pretty pumped to have Pete back there,” Schaefer said. “We really wanted to show him how great of a team we are and what a great group we’ve got in here.”
It was the second time this year the Islanders put 24 shots on goal in a period. But with it being the first period after replacing their head coach, in a game they needed to win, the Islanders’ first period Thursday felt different.
“I thought we played fast, and it looked like a seamless transition to some of the things we were trying to do,” DeBoer said.
Matthew Schaefer Was Spectacular Again
DeBoer is famously hard on young players, but he had nothing negative to say about the Islanders’ 18-year-old defenseman.
“For me, watching him from the bench live like that is just wow,” DeBoer said. “To see him live like that, at the age he’s at and how dynamic he is, at both ends of the rink, … he’s a really, really special player.”
Schaefer once again led all Islanders skaters in time on ice (24:49) and of course broke the 2-all tie with his record-tying goal, which knotted him with Brian Leetch in 1988-89.
“I can’t say enough great things about him and the way he plays,” Islanders defenseman Tony DeAngelo said. “Just a special player, a special talent.”
Plus, on a night in which Islanders goalie Ilya Sorokin made just 13 saves, and let in a pair of really bad goals, Schaefer also supported his netminder by calmly saving his goalie with a goal-line save on Toronto’s first shot of the game.
“Sorokin doesn’t let many of those in. He’s the best goalie in the world,” Schaefer said. “I think we’ve got to help him when something like that happens. He has our back so much … if that’s what I can do, that’s what I can do.”
The Islanders’ Power Play Saved the Day
Though they were thoroughly dominant on the shot clock, the Isles still found themselves in a tie game after Easton Cowen’s power-play goal early in the second period.
But New York’s moribund power play came to life in the game’s second half. Emil Heineman scored his 22nd goal, and fourth on the power play, that ultimately was the game-winning goal, and Ritchie gave the Isles some breathing room at 10:20 that gave them a 5-2 lead.
“We have great personnel on our PP,” Schaefer said. “I think we went out there and were like ‘let’s try to make something happen.'”
The Islanders’ man-advantage was a major talking point over DeBoer’s first days as head coach. New York entered play with a 16.7% man-advantage, the 30th-best mark, and had scored on just three of its previous 16 PPs (15%).
But the Isles power play was lethal Thursday. Mathew Barzal set up Heineman’s goal after they zipped the puck around in the offensive zone, and Heineman fired a laser past Akhtyamov, giving the Isles a 4-2 advantage.
“I thought we just moved [the puck] around,” Schaefer said. “I think we’ve been waiting. We’ve had that in the tank. We just had to unleash it.”
Ritchie’s goal, which came on a five-on-three in the third, came after Akhtyamov made a spectacular left-pad stop on Schenn. But the puck bounced right onto Ritchie’s stick, giving New York a 5-2 advantage.
“There’s been some signs prior to me getting here of it starting to turn and go the right way,” DeBoer said. “Like any of your systems, you need to be rewarded to build on the belief. … We’ve got to build on that.”
