Top Shelf – Islanders Daily 4/30/2013

Middletown, N. J. – The last quiet night in the National Hockey League for the next eight weeks has come and gone. All that was on the agenda last night was the annual draft lottery and the Colorado Avalanche came away winners as their ball was chosen to select first in the June entry draft in Newark, NJ.

The Florida Panthers, who finished three points below the Avalanche in the standings will select second. The top three obvious choices on the board will be defensman Seth Jones and forwards Nathan McKinnon and Jonathan Drouin.

For the Islanders, it was a day of practice, practice and more practice. The team skated for the third consecutive day preparing to open the playoffs tomorrow night in Pittsburgh against the Penguins. It was all hands on deck as the recent Bridgeport call-ups were all present getting some work in. Coach Jack Capuano did not comment on or speculate on what his lineup outside of starting goaltender Evgeni Nabokov would look like come 7pm, but the assumption could be made that Eric Boulton, Marty Reasoner and Matt Carkner might not be seeing much of the ice at Consol Energy Center.

Look for our series primer coming later this afternoon.

Links

• Giving a little glance outside the Eastern Conference and Isles, Rich Diaz and myself previewed two Western series. Blues and Blackhawks.
• Dom from LHH writes on why you should root for the NY Islanders.
• Johnny Feulner of Pens Labyrinth writes on what the Pens have to do to beat the Isles.
• Other series previews : NHL.com | Bleacher Report | ESPN

Around the Twitter-Sphere

• There really is nothing else to say…this is such a great inspirational quote for the Islanders and should be plastered on their locker room wall.

• Ah, the sweet smell of expectations…..We have seen teams rise up to them and ride the wave and we have also seen teams crushed by the pure weight of them. The Isles should be light as a feather.

• Trying to muster up a little old magic is never a bad thing – The Isles are going to need some good karma along with mistake free defensive play in this series.

• The smartest way to go is to always offset a negative with a positive and it’s done brilliantly here. An objective, honest series pick followed by the major reason the Isles can steal this series.

Around The NHL

• Its time. The Playoffs get underway tonight with three Western Conference series playing game one. The Minnesota Wild travel to Chicago to take on the Blackhawks at 8:00 EST, Los Angeles invades St.Louis at 8:00 EST and Detroit takes on the Ducks at 10:30 EST. Your complete playoff viewing guide for round one is found here.

NHL.com Stanley Cup Playoff video….gave me goosebumps to be honest. Isles are in this one.

I will leave you with this….Please stay tuned this afternoon for our series primer as we get ready to knock the Penguins off their high horse and stake our claim in the gladiator tournament. Thanks for sticking with EyesOnIsles and keep it right here throughout the entire playoffs.