Islanders best player acquired by trade from every NHL team

Since joining the league in 1972, the New York Islanders have made a ton of trades. Here’s the best player they acquired by trade from every current NHL team.

Since joining the league in 1972, the New York Islanders have had a number of deals with just about every team in the NHL. Over the Isles 48 year history, they’ve made 240 trades with the other 30 teams currently in the league.

Their most common trade partner? The Montreal Canadiens with 20 trades. That number is boosted thanks to a significant number of cash trades back in the 70s.

Between the 1972 and 1977 drafts, there are 12 trades where players are swapped for cash. Two players, Tony Featherstone and Murray Anderson were traded to the Isles from the Canadiens on June 26, 1972, for cash and then traded back to the Habs less than six months later, again for cash.

And while we know the Islanders and Rangers rarely trade (they’ve done so three times since 1972) the Isles have also rarely traded with the Detroit Red Wings and the St Louis Blues with four trades between each team.

The last time the Islanders and Red Wings made a deal was on May 26, 1991, when Alan Kerr and future considerations were sent to the motor city for Rick Green. That was almost 29 years ago!

Looking through the Isles trade history, I wanted to know what was the best player acquired in a trade by the Isles from every current NHL team.

I’m not looking at the best value received in a trade. I don’t really care want went the other way for this post. I just looked at who was the best player the Isles got from each team.

For this, I only considered trades that were made with current NHL teams. So that means the Ray Ferraro trade with the Hartford Whalers won’t be on this list. The deal that sent Dave Cameron and Bob Lorimer to the Colorado Rockies for the third overall pick in 1983 (Pat LaFontaine) also won’t be on this list

Sometimes I found it hard to settle on a specific player so I added an honorable mention for the player that could have easily slotted in instead.

I broke it down by division from East to West. First up, the Atlantic Division.