New York Islanders Need to Get Back to Their Winning Formula

The New York Islanders have been struggling for the last three weeks. The reason being is the Isles have gotten away from their winning formula.

Heading into Monday’s contest versus the Columbus Blue Jackets, the New York Islanders have gone 4-5-1 in their last ten games. Even in their wins, their play has been inconsistent.

With less than a month left in the regular season, the Islanders have to get back to the road map that has brought them success.

Winning Formula

From afar people have looked at the Islanders roster and been asking themselves how are Barry Trotz and the Isles near the top of the Metro division?

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The answer to this question is the Islanders are playing winning hockey as a team up and down the lineup. The Isles formula has been relentless team defense, willing to battle as well as winning a majority of those battles, and making the right decisions with the puck.

By doing so the Isles have been one of the better teams in the league limiting the opposition to high-quality scoring chances. The blue and orange have been keeping teams to the outside and when a hiccup does occur either Robin Lehner or Thomas Greiss is there to clean up the mistake.

When the Islanders are following this formula they are an awful hard team to play against and because of that, it’s led to an extremely successful season, one that no one predicted.

Strength in Numbers

If the Islanders have a superpower it’s they have strength in numbers. While the Islanders currently do not have a superstar player (Mathew Barzal is a budding star) what they do have is a very deep roster. The depth of the Islanders this season (23-man roster) has been their secret sauce this season, to quote Trotz.

The Isles deep roster enables them to follow their winning formula on a nightly basis. The Isles throw four forward lines and three defensive units at their opponents each and every night, splitting up the minutes pretty equally. In addition, they have a two-headed monster in goal with Lehner and Greiss.

During this cold streak, a number of players have not pulled the rope like they should come game time. Equally frustrating it’s been different players each night during this bad stretch who have failed to follow the winning formula.

For the Islanders to be successful they have to have their superpower, strength in numbers in full force and playing the “Islander Way”. This means all 20 guys need to be pulling the rope on a nightly basis.

The Isles got back to their winning formula Monday night at the Coliseum against the Jackets. To no surprise, it resulted in a 2-0 victory.