Islanders Offense Falls Short in Tampa Bay (Highlights)

There were fireworks right from the jump in this one as Zdeno Chara and Pat Maroon dropped the gloves. Ironically, Big Z was one of like two guys on the Islanders roster who weren’t here when these teams met up in the playoffs just a few months ago.

Anyway, the Islanders got out to a solid start as Zach Parise was able to find Mathew Barzal with a beautiful feed and an even nicer finish.

Unfortunately, the Isles gave it right back. Just 23 seconds later, a Sebastian Aho turnover led to Mathieu Joseph scoring his second goal of the season to tie this one up. Later in the period, Anders Lee would go off for hooking at 17:16.

They were able to kill the penalty but weren’t able to get the puck out of the zone which led to Anthony Cirelli scoring. With just 38 seconds left in the period, the Isles weren’t able to escape, instead, it was Tampa exiting with a 2-1 lead after one.

The second period was extremely chippy. No goals were scored on either side but the highlight of the period was this sequence:

Initially, Brock Nelson was called for a major. Instead, after review, they determined that it was a minor penalty and the Islanders would continue on their unsuccessful power play. They’d go right back on the man advantage when Kyle Palmieri was tripped but to no prevail.

Through two periods, the Islanders were 0-for-3 on the power play with just two shots on goal over that span. It’s unacceptable. Both Josh Bailey and Sebastian Aho looked disinterested in shooting the puck on the man advantage.

In the third period, the Islanders slept walk through the period until roughly the 13-minute mark. They had a couple of chances after a Matt Martin penalty and then, well, there were five Islanders who couldn’t find the puck and Braydon Point had it fall onto his stick and made no mistake about it to make it a 3-1 game.

On a power play for Tampa Bay, Steven Stamkos was able to find the back of the net with ease in the Ovie office for his eighth of the season. One more game. The Isles have one more go against the Florida Panthers before they head home to open UBS. Hopefully, the offense makes the trip with them.