Islanders: Three Takeaways from Shootout Loss in Buffalo

The New York Islanders played uninspired and seemingly uninterested hockey for the second time in two nights as they fell to Buffalo in the shootout.

On Tuesday night, already having dropped points against the Buffalo Sabres on Monday, the New York Islanders looked to rebound with a win in western New York. But owing to a poor defensive performance and the once again unlikely heroics of ECHL lifer Michael Houser, the Islanders didn’t rebound. Instead, they fell in the shootout.

Here are three takeaways from the loss.

1. Islanders Did Not Play Barry Trotz Hockey

The New York Islanders got away from the brand of hockey that has made them so successful under head coach Barry Trotz on Tuesday. Playing against a Sabres team who have been one of the worst NHL squads at generating scoring chances and goals at 5v5, the Islanders simply handed them opportunities to create offense.

With Mathew Barzal out of the lineup, one might’ve surmised prior to Tuesday’s game that the Islanders would struggle to generate offensive opportunities for themselves. That didn’t turn out to be the case.

There were plenty of uncashed opportunities for the Islanders to score. Players like Adam Pelech, Anthony Beauvillier, and Oliver Wahlstrom all had a handful of chances from the inner slot or nearby that were not converted.

Sure, those opportunities didn’t become goals for the most part, but they were created. The looks were there in greater numbers than they usually are for the Islanders, according to Natural Stat Trick. The offense wasn’t the problem, no matter how bad the optics of being beaten twice in two nights by an ECHL journeyman goalie are.

The problem was defense. The Isles turned the puck over far too frequently and easily. They looked lazy, almost uninterested in playing in their own zone, and that effort reflected itself in the many opportunities Buffalo had as well.

According to MoneyPuck’s Deserve to Win O’Meter, the Islanders should’ve won Tuesday’s game almost 72% of the time, if both goalies had regressed to average.

Of course, we know that’s not how hockey is played. Some nights a goalie just shuts you down. I wouldn’t say Houser stymied the Islanders in that sense, but it was fairly clear that New York could’ve done a lot more to close down the prime real estate from which Buffalo took many of their shots.

In the end, they didn’t do that. The Sabres converted at a more efficient clip, and that’s in large part due to the Islanders just not playing their style.

2. Islanders Recent xG Metrics Reflect Poor Play

The New York Islanders 5v5 Score and Venue Adjusted statistics for the first three months of the 2020-21 NHL season were extremely good. Their 56.07 xGF% between January 13 and April 1 was the third-best mark in that category across the NHL, and it reflected the 5v5 dominance of the Islanders to that point in the season.

*All stats courtesy of Evolving Hockey

What xGF% basically can tell you is that the Islanders were accumulating scoring chances in greater quantity and quality than their head-to-head opponents at a better rate than 28 other NHL teams through the first of April.

Unfortunately, things have gone a bit off the rails for the Islanders since then. Their xGF% between April 3 and May 4 sits at 49.36%, a staggering drop from the lofty heights of the early and mid-season, which has seen them fall to 17th-best in the NHL in xGF%.

Per 60 minutes, the Islanders xGF fell from 2.45 to 2.28. Meanwhile, their xGA/60 has risen from 1.92 to 2.34, which in reality is probably a much worse sign for this team than the former.

I know there will probably be those people who say “but analytics have never favored the Islanders, and they did pretty well last year.” And that’s fair, but it also would be ignoring the fact that the Islanders became analytics darlings during their time in the Toronto bubble, and that they had done so to an even greater degree this season.

The Islanders were genuinely one of the best analytics teams in the NHL as we turned the calendar to April. Since then, they’ve fallen to a mediocre one, and we’ve seen that on the ice.

This most recent tough stretch has been the worst slump the Islanders have encountered all season. It’s booted them from a top-two place in the East Division to a team who simply looked content with fourth on Monday and Tuesday.

And while there’s a lot to break down and digest about the team’s downward trend, that’s probably best left for another day. For now, the team’s goal should just be getting the train back on the rails before the first round of the Stanley Cup playoffs, which are not far away at all now.