Capuano wants Isles to keep playing hard

Six games to go, and the very best the Islanders can hope for -- by winning all six -- is a .500 record (35-35-12). Another winter of much discontent. No playoffs for a fourth consecutive year.

Yet . . .

"I wish it would keep going," said Jack Capuano, who was parachuted into the rising depression of a prematurely lost season as interim coach Nov. 15. "Because I thought we were playing really well. The big thing now, knowing we are out [of postseason play], that's what we addressed today.

"I've read some of [the players'] quotes after we got eliminated, and I hope they read mine, because it's about habits, and staying within the team concept with the last few games we have left. Enjoy it, but play hard."

Under Capuano, the Islanders are 25-25-9, evidence that the players have bought what he is selling in his first NHL head-coaching job.

Though that didn't happen instantly.

The team went 1-8-2 upon his arrival and, "looking back, we still lost all those games by a goal," he said Monday.

"There'd be five minutes left in the game and we're up by a goal and we still lost in regulation. They didn't, for whatever reason, have the confidence or belief. They didn't know how to win. After a month or two, they started to understand the system and what we were looking for. And when they had some success, they got belief in it."

Part of the narrative was that Capuano created a looser atmosphere than Scott Gordon. His first chore was, "How do I corral these 20 guys and get them on the same page?" And then, get them "to pay attention to detail."

It helped that he had coached several of the players with Bridgeport and knew their strengths and weaknesses, but "you have to know where they are, not only in hockey but where they are in the rest of their lives as well," he said. There were chats over coffee, chats in the locker room.

"Sometimes they don't care how much you know but how much you care,'' Capuano said. "I will say that a lot of credit to success down the stretch goes to the players because they responded to what we tried. Because, at the end of the day, they're the ones who have to execute. They're the ones who have to go out there and play for one another, within the team concept."

In his many years of hockey, as player and coach, Capuano, 44, never had experienced the kind of losing and hard luck he found when he arrived. Who has?

"Never would I dream of 550 man-games lost [to injury] or the way our goaltenders or our defense went down this year," he said. "I've never seen anything like it."

Plus, there was the age thing. "You're coaching them on the bench," he said, "and then they come into your office for a one-on-one, and they take that helmet off and you see how young they are. You know, it hits you. My kids are 16 and 18, and it's like dealing with that a little bit."

But why stop now?

"In the future," Capuano said, "they've got some character guys here, and with the draft picks in Bridgeport, if they can stay healthy . . . "