Islanders beaten badly by Canadiens for fourth straight loss
Semyon Varlamov of the Islanders reacts after surrendering a goal during the second period against the Canadiens at Barclays Center on Tuesday. Credit: Jim McIsaac
This better be rock bottom for the Islanders.
Because it couldn’t get much worse than Tuesday night’s 6-2 loss to the Canadiens at the Barclays Center, their soon-to-be-former home rink where the Islanders lost in regulation for the first time this season.
“Most things,” Cal Clutterbuck said when asked what went wrong. “We’re not ourselves right now. We’ve just got to find ourselves.”
But how can a team lose itself so badly in the midst of a playoff race, trailing 3-0 after one period coming off a 4-0 loss to the NHL-leading Bruins on Saturday.
“I can’t answer that question,” Clutterbuck said. “If you know the answer, then you know how to fix it. Good teams and teams that have character find a way out. And when you find your way out, you’re better because of it.”
If this isn’t rock bottom, the Islanders, who have lost four straight (0-2-2) will have a very hard time of earning a second straight postseason berth. The Islanders (35-22-8) still hold the first wild-card position in the Eastern Conference but fell four points behind the third-place Penguins in the Metropolitan Division.
“It’s frustrating, it’s unacceptable,” said defenseman Ryan Pulock, whose five-on-three power-play goal made it 5-2 at 16:21 of the third period before Joel Armia added a shorthanded empty-netter at 17:10. “There’s winning and losing but it’s more frustrating when you don’t get an effort. We just didn’t have that tonight. We weren’t ourselves.”
Yet the frustration of the loss was tempered by the scary sight of defenseman Johnny Boychuk frantically skating off the ice covering his face with his glove after Artturi Lehknonen’s skate blade hit him around the nose/left eye area at 8:42 of the third period. Coach Barry Trotz did not have an immediate update.
Nothing went right for the Islanders, who are now 2-6-2 since identity-setting center Casey Cizikas had his left leg lacerated by the skate blade of Flyers defenseman Ivan Provorov on Feb. 11. The Islanders lost puck battles, turned the puck over and were sloppy with their passes. They tried to play too cute and make too many individual plays without enough straight-line play to the Canadiens’ crease.
“We’ve got to put more skin in the game,” Trotz said. “You can’t win at this time of the year unless you put more skin in the game to earn points. So, we got exactly what we deserved today.”
The Canadiens (31-28-9), who played without top-line left wing Tomas Tatar the final two periods, made it 4-0 on Paul Byron’s shorthanded goal off defenseman Devon Toews’ turnover at 12:35 of the second period.
“I don’t know if we’re fragile,” Trotz said. “We’re squeezing it a little bit. The puck was a grenade on their stick.
“You’ve got to play the game that’s presented to you and some guys refuse to do that,” Trotz added.
Thomas Greiss was pulled in favor of Semyon Varlamov (12 saves) after allowing three goals on 12 shots in the first period. Carey Price made 20 saves, though he ruined his own shutout bid as his turnover to Josh Bailey behind the crease led to Brock Nelson’s goal to make it 4-1 at 6:14 of the third period, snapping the Islanders’ goal-less drought at 153:03.
“You can’t have starts like this if we want to be successful,” said captain Anders Lee, who fought defenseman Christian Folin at 16:16 of the first period, though that failed to spark his teammates. “We can’t be behind every night starting off the game. We’ve got to stick together and move forward.”
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.
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