Tag Archive for 'new-jersey-devils'
Here’s what some folks were syaing after yesterday’s big win. Playoffs!
“I thought of that between the overtime and the shootout: ‘Gee, this is tough to swallow if we don’t make it,’” Wade Dubielewicz told Newsday.
“A lot of people counted us out because we were injured,” Brendan Witt told Newsday. “The big thing is we didn’t quit. Dubie played phenomenal the last four games. It’s sweet to get in, and now we’ve got to focus on a good Buffalo team.”
“What a wild finish,” Maple Leafs’ GM John Ferguson told the Toronto Star. “Unfortunately for us, we didn’t give ourselves enough room at the end. I give them (the Isles) credit for getting it done.”
“If you’re an old-school hockey fan, you’re probably not too excited about the way this finished,” Devils centre Scott Gomez told the AP. “If you ask a fan who was here today, I’m sure they would tell you it was incredible.”
“I’m feeling pretty Hollywood-ish today,” Coach Ted Nolan told the New York Daily News. “I don’t think I was breathing the last five minutes and through the shootout. … It’s very gratifying, especially with the early polls picking us 30th (in the 30-team NHL). This has been a special team and special season. Now we have a chance to continue it.”
“Last Sunday, we were pretty much done … but everything fell into place at the right time,” Mike Sillinger told the News. “It’s all pretty unbelievable. But we’ll believe it when we wake up (today).”
I almost threw up my Easter ham when John Madden scored with .9 seconds left in the game to tie it, but the you-can’t-kill-us-Islanders are HEADED TO THE STANLEY CUP PLAYOFFS thanks to another stellar performance by Wade Dubielewicz who stopped 2/3 attempts in the shootout. The Isles will head to Buffalo to take on the #1 ranked Sabres in Game 1 on Thursday night. Woo!
Who will be in goal for the Devils today who clinched a playoff berth two weeks ago? Will they sit record-breaking Martin Broudeur for only the 4th time this season for Scott Clemmensen? Marty had a new NHL record 48 wins this season, 6 of them coming against the Islanders. The NY Post gives us an update (but no clear answer).
Bloody murder will be screamed in Toronto if Martin Brodeur doesn’t play today and the Islanders nip the Maple Leafs for the final Eastern Conference playoff berth.
His Devils are locked in, ready to face the Lightning in the first round, and Lou Lamoriello was considering resting Martin Brodeur this afternoon when the Islanders and Devils complete the season at the Meadowlands.
“We’re going to make a decision [today],” Lamoriello said.
Although Brodeur said earlier in the week he didn’t like the idea of sitting out today because he’d be starting the playoffs without a game for a week, the record-setting 48-game winner indicated higher authorities may want him to rest for the fourth time this season.
So here we are 5 games left, 2 points out, destiny in our own hands. For a moment, let’s forget that we are missing our 15-year franchise goalie, missing our trade deadline blockbuster, missing a forward suspended for 25 games, and missing so many defensemen that GM Snow has signed two players from the German Hockey League this week alone. Just another season in the life of a Ringling Bros and Charles Wang’s Circus hockey team fan – right?
Let’s look at 6 games, 8 points and what could have been a comfortable 6th place in the Conference with 91 points.
5. Bruins 4 Islanders 3 (OT/SH) 2/10/07
The Bruins have been doing the Islanders no favors the past three weeks, rolling over TWICE to BOTH Montreal and the Rangers giving those teams important points. Meanwhile back in February, the Islanders threw away a point vs the lowly Bruins failing to hold onto a 3-2 lead with 16 minutes left to play. The teams played a scoreless OT which forced a marathon shootout that saw ex-Islander Zdeno Chara score the game winner in round 9 of the shootout.
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4A. Rangers 2 Islanders 1 (OT/SH) 3/5/07
4B. Rangers 2 Islanders 1 3/8/07
OK so this list is supposed to be 5 games, but it’s pretty hard to separate these two games. It’s early March and the Isles are in the playoff hunt. They have a home and home against the Rangers who they are 4-0 against already this season – a chance to expand their 4 point lead in the standings – and they manage to get only 1 point out of the two games.
First on a Monday night at the Garden, the Islanders defense fails to show up. Maybe it was bowling night? DiPietro bails them out all night long with an Islander record 56 saves, but it’s not enough as the Islanders lose in a shootout.
Then three days later on a Thursday night at the Coliseum in what is affectionately known as “The Simon Game”, the Islanders play a much better game and are tied 1-1 in a third until Simon loses his cool and force feeds Ryan Hollweg some lumber. The Rangers score on the resulting powerplay and the Isles lose 2-1 in regulation.
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3. Canadiens 5 Islanders 3 3/13/07
If the Islanders fail to make the playoffs, this is the game that will get all the attention. DiPietro comes way out of the net in the first period to play the puck and collides with Montreal’s Steve Begin. DP leaves the game, misses the next two, and two weeks later the Islanders finally fess up and admit he suffered a concussion on the play. Dunham comes in the game and lets up 5 goals on 32 shots as the Islanders blow leads of 2-0 and 3-2 to a team they are battling neck and neck for a playoff spot – another four point swing.
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2. Red Wings 4 Islanders 3 (OT) 1/30/07
The Isles had a tough schedule after the All-Star break, first there was Atlanta – they came back from 3 goals down to force OT and get a point on the road. Then they hosted Buffalo and won with a 3 goal explosion in the 3rd period. Finally, they hosted Detroit and were sporting a 3 goal lead after 2 periods when things went south.
Detroit rallied for 3 goals (2 powerplay) to tie the game and force OT – where Henrik Zetterberg finished the Isles about halfway through. Detroit outshot the Isles 11-5 in the third and 3-0 in the OT.
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1. Blues 3 Islanders 2 (OT) 3/1/07
So blowing a 3 goal lead to a good team in the last 20 minutes is bad, how could the Islanders ever top that one?
March 1st: the first day of the last full month of the NHL season, time to prepare for the playoffs, Ryan Smyth’s first game as an Islander…and the Islanders go out and blow a 2-0 lead AT HOME in the final 2 1/2 minutes to a team with no chance of making the playoffs. Un-frickin-believable. Adding insult to injury, DiPietro picks up a penalty before the end of regulation and it takes the Blues just 20 seconds to score the PP game winner in OT . That’s 3 goals in the 3 minutes to a team near the bottom of the “goals scored” category all season.
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Honorable Mentions:
11/30/06 and 1/2/07 – The Islanders sport the NHL’s worst team, the Flyers, a 3-0 lead in both of these games and then come up one goal short in the comeback effort, losing 3-2.
12/30/06 and 1/4/07 – Right in the middle of their season high 6 game losing streak, Martin Brodeur personally steals 4 points from the Islanders. The first game should have been a 0-0 tie after regulation – the Devils scored a fluke goal when Islanders defenseman Alan Rouke tries to bat the puck out of the air…and into the net. The other goal that night was an empty netter. Five days later, Brodeur makes 40 saves, 17 in the third period as the Devils hold of the Islanders.
We’ve been slacking on posting the highlights around here lately, sorry.
Islanders vs. Rangers
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Islanders vs. Devils
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It was a wild finish in front of a sold out Nassau Coliseum Saturday night vs the New Jersey Devils. After 58 1/2 minutes of scoreless hockey between the teams, the Devils’ John Madden beat Ricky over his right shoulder with a hard wrister for the 1-0 lead. This sent some of the less loyal fans headed for the parking lot to beat the traffic.
Suckers. Here’s the scene from inside the Coliseum as Miro Satan put in a rebound with 0.7 seconds left to send the game into OT. Yeah, I missed the actual goal on film. Can you blame me?
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Wow. The crowd was fired up after that. Here’s the Let’s Go Islanders chant.
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Alas, it was not to be. A Bruno Gervais turnover in OT left Ricky alone with 2 Devils, and Scott Gomez scored the game winner in OT.
Despite the lack of scoring, it was an entertaining game. The Islanders had a good number of chances and a couple of pucks that skidded just wide of the goalposts. Ricky played well and had a couple of big saves too. It was the first night of the 6-game ticket plan I purchased and was a good crowd. The Islanders announced it was a sellout, I’d estimate the actual attendance at about 90% of capacity. Making the night even better my brother and I finally found Canadian beer for sale at the Coliseum, stumbling upon a vendor selling Molson XXX. Hells freakin’ yeah. The guy next to me must have known about the Molson’s already, he was trashed and stunk like a brewery everytime he turned to open his mouth and slur out a question. “What num-bersssss is Jashhhhhon Blake and Shhhhawn Batesssss?”. I just hope this guy didn’t buy the 6-game plan too.
Isles’ matinee tomorrow at noon vs the Lightning. The $19 Havoc Energy seats go on sale at 10:30am. Damn that’s early for hockey. Look for me on my couch with some coffee for some updates.
Video highlights from NHL.com
Get your scorecards here! You can’t tell the players without a scorecard! A few roster changes for tonight’s game in Carolina.
- Shawn Bates is out tonight with a hand injury. If I remember correctly, he got popped blocking a Devils’ shot on Thursday night. Frans Nielsen has been called up from Bridgeport to take his roster spot.
The New York Islanders have recalled center Frans Nielsen from the Bridgeport Sound Tigers of the American Hockey League. Nielsen, a 2002 third round draft pick of the Islanders, is poised to become the first Danish-born player to ever appear in an NHL game.
In 33 games with Bridgeport this season, Nielsen has scored 10 goals with 13 assists for 23 points and 4 penalty minutes. He also had a +3 plus/minus rating. Nielsen was signed by the Islanders to a two-year contract on May 15, 2006.
- Satan should play tonight, he sat out part of Thursday’s game and Friday’s practice with a swollen ankle.
- As mentioned here yesterday, defenseman Fred Meyer is expected to make his Islanders debut.
- Garth Snow…The Hardest Working GM in the League? Isles made a minor league deal with Ottawa yesterday.
The Ottawa Senators completed a minor trade Friday, sending defenseman Tomas Malec to the New York Islanders for center Matt Koalska.
Koalska was assigned to Binghamton of the American Hockey League.
A fifth-round pick of Nashville in 2000, Koalska was signed by New York as a free agent in August 2004. The 26-year-old native of Minnesota has split time this season with Bridgeport and Hershey, recording three goals and two assists in 14 games.
Koalska made his NHL debut with the Islanders last season, registering two penalty minutes in three contests.
Malec, who was selected in the third round of the 2001 draft by Florida, collected a goal and 12 assists in 33 games with Binghamton this campaign. The 24-year-old Slovakian has appeared in 45 NHL contests with Carolina and Ottawa, notching two assists and 47 penalty minutes.
- Newsday’s Greg Logan looks at the new-look Islanders roster on his Newsday blog.
- Milbury is gone (sort of) but Milbury bashing never dies. Thursday night’s hero for the Devils, Zach Parise could have been an Islander. Eric at Off Wing Opinion looks at another one of Mad Mike’s blunders. Maybe one of these days Nilsson will join the big club and exonerate Milbury.
But it wasn’t to be. Instead, with the 17th pick in the first round Milbury, most likely going with the advice of another ex-Islander, Andres Kallur, snapped up Robert Nilsson, son of ex-NHLer Kent Nilsson. Just two picks later, the Devils snapped up Zach at #19.
And while Nilsson is still a promising prospect a little less than a week short of his 22nd birthday, he’s still in the AHL with Bridgeport while the younger Parise is making a significant one at the NHL level right now.
In isolation, it’s just the sort of judgement call NHL GMs are forced to make in the draft every single year. But when you match it up with the remainder of Milbury’s record as a GM, his tenure on the Island looks all the more disastrous.
It figures, for the first time since December 23rd the Isles scored 3 or more goals but even that couldn’t stop them from dropping their 5th straight game, 4-3 to the New Jersey Devils last night. I feel like Rob Schneider in “The Waterboy”.
With the way DP’s been playing, and Marty Brodeur at the other end of the ice, it was quite a surprise when it was 2-1 Devils only 3 minutes into the game. Two Islander turnovers quickly ended up in the back of the net and then Trent Hunter got the Islanders on the board with a deflection goal. Zach Parise of the Devils picked up his second goal of the game later in the first for a 3-1 Devils lead after one period of play. Now Parise was all alone in front on the first goal because of the turnover, and his second goal came on a 2 on 1 situation, so the defense left DP out to dry on both goals…BUT…Parise just made DP look silly on both goals. He committed way too early on both of them. Elias made it 4-1 Devils in the 2nd on a sharp angle slapshot that found a way past DP. Ricky’s certainly entitled to a bad game ever now and then, but he picked a poor time to do it.
Hilbert picked up his 4th of the year in the second, and Sillinger scored with just 20 seconds left during a 6-on-4 powerplay with DP pulled. The Isles outshot the Devils 43-26 but Marty outplaying DP was the difference.
It was an interesting night at “The Swamp” with an announced crowd of 12,500+, a decent size for a Devils crowd. As we walked up to our seats I thought the interior was pretty dimly lit until they turned on the main lights on the ice. It’s also kind of cold up there as there seems to be a breeze, did someone leave a door open on the roof? The Devils fans that are there support their team pretty well, and we were more than happy to join along with them for several “Rangers Suck” chants. A few idiots wandered in wearing Rangers jerseys and were heckled by fans of both teams. During a stoppage in play to replace a broken piece of glass, they played the “long” version of the Chicken Dance. Since Wang has outlawed it at the Coliseum, it seems the Devils were more than happy to adopt it. We spotted “Goldie” the Islanders fan with the shiny gold wig from the Coliseum down by the glass dancing up a storm as all fans joined in the chorus of “The Rangers Suck!”. Goldie’s seats were practically the same seats he has at the Coliseum, what does that guy do for a living? Who does he know?
Bring back the #%!* Chicken Dance Wang!
Isles head to Carolina to play the Hurricanes tomorrow night. They’ve got to end this skid ASAP.
Video highlights from NHL.com
Losers of 4 straight games and scorers of 3 goals in that span, the slumping Isles visit the first place New Jersey Devils tonight. Jason Blake has scored 3 of our past 5 goals…in a 5 game span. The Isles have started off 2007 in a major funk. Coach Nolan has decided to shake the lines up tonight.
Islanders coach Ted Nolan elected to alter his lines yesterday at practice. Shawn Bates skated on the second line with Viktor Kozlov and Miroslav Satan.
“By shaking it up a little bit, sometimes it works,” said Nolan, who also put Chris Simon on the first line and Arron Asham on the fourth. “We have to get Satan and Kozlov going a little bit. Bates is responsible defensively and also gives enough speed to generate some things offensively. There’s no discredit to Robitaille, but it wasn’t working.”
Robitaille hasn’t scored in seven games with the Islanders, and Satan and Kozlov are pointless in their last five. During Tuesday’s 3-2 loss to Philadelphia, Richard Park got some time on the second line. Now it’s Bates turn.
The solution is clear. It is time to reveal my super-top-secret plan for Islanders domination of the NHL. I’ve shared this ingenious idea with many close friends and fans over the past 3+ seasons of NHL hockey, but I have resisted making it public because of it’s controversial nature. I am not sure the public is ready for it, but now is the perfect time to reveal it…
Ladies and gentlemen, the Islanders must clone Jason Blake. We need 5 Jason Blakes on the ice at all time. DP, Dunham, and 18 Jason Blakes on the roster and 25 Jason Blakes in Bridgeport, ready to go, should one of the other Jason Blakes get injured. Mr. Wang, make it happen. Get some bio-technical geniuses on the payroll in some super-top-secret location working on it now.
In all seriousness, the NHL season is quite long and every team goes through slumps. Better now than in March I say. I have faith in Coach Nolan, he’ll shuffle the lines and do whatever it takes to get this team scoring again. Our loss last week to the Devils was on a early fluke goal, and we beat up on Jersey in the swamp back in November, let’s do it again. I’m going to game with my brother and an old co-worker who’s a Devils fan, should be fun tonight.
Catching up on the Isles highlights, although there haven’t been many.
Philly
Buffalo
Devils
Atlantic GP W L OTL Pts
Pittsburgh 10 7 3 0 14
NY Islanders 12 6 4 2 14
NY Rangers 13 7 6 0 14
New Jersey 12 6 5 1 13
Philadelphia 12 3 8 1 7
Of all the games to miss…the Islanders best game of the season. 5 goals vs Brodeur and only 16 shots allowed to the Devils. Were the Devils only allowed to wear one skate last night or something? I missed the whole game and couldn’t DVR it either. Come on Google, post the #@^&! game already.
The Islanders beat the Devils last night 5-2 to put them into a 3-way tie for first place in the Atlantic Division. They are also now tied for 6th in the Conference. It is also only November 3rd, so this all counts for nothing really. But the Islanders are playing well so far this season. Hunter and Satan scored in the first, for both of them it was their first goals since the season opening road trip. Check out the highlights, Satan’s goal is a nice backhand that he roofs from the side of the net over Brodeur, and Blake and Yashin play some nice Tic-Tac-Toe on the final goal.
P.S. Announced crowd in the swamp was only 8,269, lower than the Coliseum’s season low.
Video highlights from NHL.com
