Right here, lastly, got here a recreation during which the Islanders went up towards a top-end opponent and checked nearly each field, together with that almost all vital one: profitable.
This was wanted in each manner, this comeback 4-2 victory over the Panthers on Sunday night time at UBS Area which noticed the Islanders put collectively a four-goal third interval to beat the defending Stanley Cup champions on the night time Mike Reilly returned to the lineup following coronary heart surgical procedure.
For the emotional state of this membership, whose sole win since buying and selling Brock Nelson was a missing efficiency at San Jose, for the playoff race during which the Islanders simply form of maintain hanging round, and for Reilly — whose restoration after greater than 4 months out is nothing wanting exceptional — this was sorely, desperately wanted.
Reilly’s presence made Sunday about greater than hockey, with the defenseman skating practically quarter-hour, notching an help and looking out as if he had not missed a beat mere months after medical doctors discovered an abnormality together with his coronary heart whereas recovering from a concussion.
Reilly’s profession was by no means in danger, however that’s the form of factor to make anybody pause and take a beat.
To come back again and play so quickly, and to take action at a excessive stage in an vital recreation, is as a lot and extra as anybody might have requested.
Even so, this was trending towards one other loss, and one other recreation during which the Islanders’ goal-scoring proved the decisive subject after buying and selling Brock Nelson.
Early within the third interval, after a 3rd scoreless energy play of the night time, a “Let’s go Panthers” chant was heard at UBS with the Islanders trailing 2-0 in a second which threatened to be the mistaken type of emblematic.
Shortly thereafter, Marc Gatcomb put the Islanders on a pathway to creating positive it could not be.
The fourth-liner took his personal rebound off Tony DeAngelo’s preliminary shot and scored a wraparound objective to deliver the Islanders inside 2-1, giving them some badly wanted momentum.
The dearth of a fourth energy play following what seemed like a Gustav Forsling journey on Gatcomb ended up being a blessing in disguise for the Islanders, as simply seconds later, Maxim Tsyplakov acquired free on the frenzy to attain his first objective since December, tying the sport at two off a feed from Reilly.
All of 17 seconds later, the Islanders have been within the lead after Noah Dobson made a play straight out of his 2023-24 season, forcing a turnover within the impartial zone and taking the puck all the way in which earlier than ending previous Vitek Vanecek for a 3-2 lead.
That, in the long run, would maintain towards a frantic Panthers push at six-on-five, with Ilya Sorokin holding the puck out throughout a number of scrambles on the crease earlier than Simon Holmstrom’s empty-net objective sealed it.
Only a couple nights after an everything-but-the-goals efficiency whereas dropping in additional time to Edmonton, the Islanders picked up proper the place they’d left off towards the Oilers: knocking on the door, however struggling to deliver it down.
The Panthers, in the meantime, wanted all of three photographs to provide their opening objective, with Aleksander Barkov feeding Sam Reinhart off Forsling’s rebound only a minute into the second interval.
By the five-minute mark, Barkov had doubled the lead, tipping Reinhart’s shot on the tail finish of a Florida energy play, with the puck bouncing off Sorokin, then looping over the goaltender’s head like an eephus pitch.
It appeared for everyone that the Islanders have been marching towards a fourth straight defeat, one more night time the place their scoring could be in query, with the conclusion that they simply don’t have sufficient firepower to compete after buying and selling Nelson staring everybody within the face.
That very nicely is likely to be true.
But when the Islanders are going to place up a battle towards such an thought, this was a great way of beginning.
