Islanders: Where goals will come from in 2021-22 lineup

Offense has been the New York Islanders biggest issue since 2018-19. The year prior the Isles finished seventh in offense with 261 goals (3.18 goals per game). But since, the Isles have put up 564 goals in 206 games (2.74 goals per game).

The Islanders are seemingly chasing upgrades to their top six, but the longer it goes without one coming in the less likely that becomes. Could that be a problem for the Isles?

Where will the goals come from for New York Islanders in 2021-22?

As far as we know, the Islanders are retaining Kyle Palmieri, Casey Cizikas, and Travis Zajac. They’ll also bring in Zach Parise so figure the Isles forward core looks like so come opening night:

Lee-Barzal-Palmieri
Beauvillier-Nelson-Bailey
Parise-Pageau-Wahlstrom
Martin-Cizikas-Clutterbuck
(Scratches: Zajac, Bellows)

Looking at that forward line doesn’t scream top-ten offense. But I wanted to look at how many goals we could expect from this squad. Looking at their ixG over the last three years what could we see in a full 82 game season in 2021-22?

So what I’m doing here is just a quick look at how many goals these players have been expected to score over a three-year sample, break it down to a per-game basis (because we’ve had a few interrupted seasons and injuries happen so games played aren’t stable across all players) in order to see how many we could expect from the min 21-22.

*ixG from NaturalStatTrick and for all situations

Of course, this is far from perfect. Oliver Wahlstrom’s is far from complete. He just turned 21 and has yet to play a full season. I could easily see him score more than 15 in a full season. By the inverse token, it’s hard to see Zach Parise scoring 26 goals over a full year from the Isles third line. It’s certainly not impossible, but it’s unlikely.

Again, this isn’t perfect. But it gives us a good frame of reference as we approach the 2021-22 season.

Consider the last full NHL season (2018-19), 217 goals over a full year would rank 26th in the NHL. So, you know, not good.

I’ll stop short of calling this a problem. Since 2018-19, the Islanders rank 24th in goals, so this seems to just maintain the status quo. Which is fine. Since 2018-19, that status quo is ninth for regular-season wins, tenth in regular-season points, and second in playoff wins.