You commit time and vitality attempting to place a finger on how the Islanders can flip the ship round.
Simon Holmstrom’s had a quiet few video games. Noah Dobson and Alexander Romanov haven’t regarded fairly like themselves throughout this five-game shedding streak. Anthony Duclair has but to emerge from his season from hell.
And then you definately bump into a stat that states the plain, and notice it would simply be that straightforward.
Ilya Sorokin, in 9 video games from March 1-21: 8.88 objectives saved above anticipated, per Evolving Hockey, with the Islanders 6-2-1 in these video games, and shedding the lone match began by Marcus Hogberg.
Sorokin and Hogberg over the 5 video games since, of which each have performed in three: negative-6.03 objectives saved above anticipated, with the Islanders winless.
Proper.
It’s the goaltending, silly.
“A couple saves he could have made, would have been the difference in that game,” coach Patrick Roy mentioned after Hogberg struggled on Sunday towards the Hurricanes, letting in six of 30 pictures because the Islanders’ comeback effort fell brief.
Hogberg, the backup since Semyon Varlamov received damage on Black Friday, has struggled badly over three begins since coming back from a hand damage earlier this month, with an .866 save share.
Although Varlamov, out with a lower-body damage, doesn’t seem more likely to return this season, the backup scenario is a secondary concern to the Islanders with 9 video games left.
Sorokin, their workhorse, appears to be like more likely to begin not less than eight of the 9, with a back-to-back in New Jersey and Philadelphia on April 12-13 offering the one apparent window to take a seat him.
And it’s Sorokin’s previous two begins, wherein he’s allowed 4 objectives apiece and regarded beatable, which might be the largest trigger for concern.
The Islanders don’t have the horses offensively to remain on this wild-card chase if their goaltending isn’t there.
They will maximize their offensive manufacturing and it received’t matter one bit, not with Mat Barzal out injured and Brock Nelson taking part in for the Avalanche.
All informed, the offensive manufacturing wasn’t an enormous drawback this weekend in Tampa and Carolina, with seven objectives unfold nearly evenly between the 2 video games.
There’s points, to make sure, and the facility play continues to be one after it coughed up a shorthanded objective on Sunday.
However in a sport the place the facility play really scored, that was one other second the place higher goaltending would have gotten the Islanders out of a jam.
“We gotta do a better job defending,” Roy mentioned. “Making sure that we keep the score as low as possible.”
That, Roy mentioned, “could maybe start with a couple saves.”
Everybody can acknowledge that it’s lower than very best for the Islanders to be so depending on their goalie, and that after offseason again surgical procedure adopted a down 2023-24 marketing campaign, a workload that may nearly definitely be over 60 begins isn’t what anyone deliberate for Sorokin.
In an up-and-down season, it’s possible, if unlikely, that Sorokin’s workload has additionally contributed to his low ebbs.
That was the case a yr in the past, and it doesn’t appear coincidental that Sorokin’s two greatest runs of the season got here when he had ample relaxation, with a powerful January that coincided with Hogberg incomes belief because the backup and a stable string of video games in March after the 4 Nations break.
Hogberg, who was signed because the third-stringer for the group, has labored out comparatively properly, however for the second straight offseason, the Islanders might want to tackle their depth chart in internet.
Do they keep on with Hogberg because the backup, put their religion within the oft-injured Varlamov or attempt to discover a backup through commerce or free company?
These questions, clearly, can’t be answered in time to affect their playoff possibilities this season.
For the following 9 video games, it’s going to should be Sorokin, and it’s going to should be the very best model of him. In any other case, the Islanders may as properly quick ahead to breakup day.
