Islanders vs. Capitals Winners and Losers: Ilya Sorokin has rough night out

In a game that mattered a whole lot the New York Islanders just didn’t show up. Sure, they scored three goals, two on a typically anemic power play, but at five-on-five the team just wasn’t there.

Which is odd because that’s supposed to be the Islanders bread and butter. They don’t typically need the power play to pull out a win because of how strong they are at even strength. Today, the special teams were the only thing to give the Isles life. They went 6-0 at 5on5.

With the loss, the Islanders are starting to lose ground on the Caps and Penguins for those two top spots in the East, and home-ice advantage in the playoffs (at least in the opening round). How the Islanders couldn’t “get up” for this one after dropping their last one 1-0 is bewildering.

And it’s not like they played particularly well in the last game either.

This loss wasn’t on any one player but here are a few losers tonight and a few winners.

Winners

Adam Pelech (1G, 2SOG): Do we call this a Cobra Strike?

How many times have you seen a defense-first defenseman take the puck coast-to-coast for a goal on the penalty kill no less? Adam Pelech did just that to even things at 2-2.

Anthony Beauvillier (1PPG, 4SOG): Five points in three games from Anthony Beauvillier. The Isles absolutely needed him to get hot down the stretch and into the post-season.

Beau’s line was the only one out there that looks like it might generate anything at 5on5.

Jean-Gabriel Pageau (1 PPG, 4SOG, 59 FOW%): Two power-play goals in one game for the Islanders. You’d think they were having a good night. Of course, this powerful power-play was all for not.

Jean-Gabriel Pageau was his solid self today both on and off the puck. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the same for the rest of the team.

Losers

Ilya Sorokin (6GA, 2 Softies): Not a good night for Ilya Sorokin. He let in six goals for the first time this season and two of those goals will be haunting him for a while. A Nic Dowd tally followed by an Evgeni Kuznetsov shot later in the game beat him far too easily.

The Islanders didn’t lose because of Sorokin (they were outscored by three), but he certainly didn’t help them stay in the game.

The Fourth Line: This was a poor game from the fourth line. Often they looked lost out there in the D-zone and it cost the Isles a number of teams.

Andy Greene (-2.20GS): Usually I don’t look at ice-time because of a game we play for the Patreon post-game show, but I happened to see Andy Greene had 20:17 of 5on5 ice time. That’s a lot of time for the veteran who’s usually close to 18-16 minutes. His -2.20 game score tells you he wasn’t any good with that ice time.