Brock Nelson, Anders Lee power Islanders past Blue Jackets

COLUMBUS, Ohio — The Islanders’ previous game against the Blue Jackets marked the reconstruction of their top two lines.

Coach Barry Trotz has seen no reason to shuffle those trios since. Especially not with Brock Nelson and Anders Lee continuing to produce at a high rate.

“We need that,” Trotz said. “The top two lines, the last 10 games, have been pretty good.”

Nelson had a goal and an assist and Lee added two assists as the Islanders opened a home-and-home series against the Blue Jackets by hanging on for a 4-3 win on Tuesday night at Nationwide Arena. The Islanders, outshot 16-3 in the third period, nearly let a three-goal, second-period lead slip.

The teams  meet again on Thursday night at UBS Arena with the Islanders (29-27-9), who snapped a two-game losing streak, two points behind the Blue Jackets (32-30-5) for fifth place in the Metropolitan Division. Neither is likely to make the playoffs.

Semyon Varlamov made 42 saves and, with Ilya Sorokin sidelined with an upper-body injury, is likely to start consecutive games for the first time this season on Thursday.

“We came out hard and we know they’re the team right ahead of us,” said Mathew Barzal, who had two assists. “Varly made some great saves.”

Varlamov had to work hard to keep the Islanders ahead in the third period as the Blue Jackets continually pressured and kept the play up ice. That included a game-saving arm save on Gustav Nyquist’s power-play shot with the Blue Jackets skating six-on-four at 17:43.

Elvis Merzlikins stopped 25 shots and defenseman Vladislav Gavrikov scored twice for the Blue Jackets. Oliver Bjorkstrand’s unassisted goal at 4:30 of the third period brought them within 4-3.

“The first two periods, we were fine,” Trotz said. “I thought in the third period we just sat back. We didn’t play. We thought we were just going to dump the puck out.”

Still, the Islanders are now 8-3-1 dating to a 6-0 win over the Blue Jackets at UBS Arena on March 10. That’s when Trotz first put Nelson between Lee and Anthony Beauvillier while moving Jean-Gabriel Pageau between Josh Bailey and Kyle Palmieri on the second line.

Nelson now has 11 goals and six assists in the 12 games since the previous win over the Blue Jackets. His sharp-angle, power-play one-timer at 11:47 of the first period tied the game at 1 as he extended his goal streak to four with his 200th career tally.

Lee has nine goals and eight assists in that span, starting with his first career hat trick in the 6-0 victory.

“We’ve built on every game,” said Lee, who had two assists. “The more you play with guys and the more success you have, there’s little plays, little things you can talk about and the communication has been there for sure. But the way Brock is playing hockey right now is pretty great and incredible.”

 Palmieri has four goals of his 11 goals and Bailey has five goals of his eight over the 12 games. Bailey, taking a feed from Pageau after creating a turnover in the neutral zone, made it 2-1 at 15:09 of the first period.

“It’s been fun playing with the two of them,” Bailey said. “Palms and I kind of complement each other and Pages seems to be going well.”

Beauvillier made it 3-1 at 3:47 of the second period on a rebound of Nelson’s shot off the crossbar and Parise, taking a pinpoint feed from Noah Dobson from the right circle to the far post, pushed it to 4-1 at 9:10 of the second period.

By Andrew Gross

andrew.gross@newsday.comAGrossNewsday

Andrew Gross joined Newsday in 2018 to cover the Islanders. He began reporting on the NHL in 2003 and has previously covered the Rangers and Devils. Other assignments have included the Jets, St. John’s and MLB.