NY Islanders compete level and mental toughness questioned after loss to Penguins

New York Islanders head coach Patrick Roy has done his best to stay positive, especially in front of cameras, throughout his team's frustrating first half of the season. However, while Sunday's 3-2 loss to the Pittsburgh Penguins wasn't the team's worst performance of the year, Roy was bothered and irked about what he saw on the ice enough to criticize his team's performance and mental toughness.

The Islanders came out sluggish in Pittsburgh less than 24 hours after defeating the same Pens team 6-3 on Saturday night at UBS Arena. After Michael Bunting scored a power-play goal 1:36 into the second period, rather than respond, backup goaltender Marcus Hogberg, making his first NHL start since 2021, had to keep the Isles in the game as Pittsburgh had 20 shots on goal in the period.

“I just felt that after we gave up that second goal, we were not mentally strong enough,” Roy said after the game. “It’s just a goal. Two goals is nothing. We prove it. You could come back in those games. Sometimes I feel we don’t believe enough in that.”

It's an indictment of the team, Roy, and his coaching staff that this veteran team knows how badly they need to string wins together, yet it comes out without a sense of urgency. The Islanders have won two games in a row only twice this season and have yet to win three straight as we near the season's midway point.

“All we had to do was focus on scoring the next one and come back here,” Roy added. “We lost the first period, we lost the second. We had to find a way to win that third period and give ourselves a chance to win the game in that third period. I didn’t think we competed like we’re capable of.”

The Islanders keep pointing to certain games, such as the recent win in Toronto, as the team they believe they are capable of being, but the manner in which they follow up those performances with outings that are the antithesis of it, makes you believe otherwise.