Can Islanders help Golden Knights with their cap problem?

The Vegas Golden Knights are in trouble. A cap clearing trade made at the deadline to send Evgeny Dadonov to Anaheim has been nixed by the NHL. Basically, Dadonov had a no-trade list and Anaheim was on it. Now the Knights only have $400,000 in cap space. Can the New York Islanders help them with that problem?

That $400,000 of cap space doesn't allow the Knights to bring in one of their pricey guys currently on LTIR. They'd have to clear considerable space to bring back someone like Alec Martinez ($5.25 million cap hit) or even Mark Stone ($9 million cap hit).

CapFriendly explains it quite nicely:

So can the Islanders "help" the Golden Knights with their problem? Yes. Yes they can.

New York Islanders: Can the "help" the Golden Knights?

On November 4, the Islanders stopped using LTIR when Boychuk was traded to Buffalo; a trade that saw the Isles dump $6 million in LTIR money after the Jack Eichel trade. And by doing so, the Islanders started accumulating daily cap space (yeah the cap is calculated daily). At the time of writing the Isles have picked up $14.6 million in cap space.

So, can the Isles "help" the Golden Knights out with their cap problem? Sure, but it's complicated. What isn't?

Because the Golden Knights aren't swimming in players they want to let go that also allows them to create enough cap space for their guys out on LTIR. Reilly Smith comes to mind because of his expiring $5 million deal, but Vegas really like him and don't want to lose him.

Dadonov is really the only option in terms of moving out big salary. But he's got an extra year on his deal with a $5 million cap hit doesn't sound like someone the Isles should be bringing in. Another middle-six forward making $5 million who's about as productive as Zach Parise?

But if the Islanders can get a good return for helping Vegas with a cap dump, why not?

Vegas has other options of course. They can still go out there and simply acquire more LTIR money. They could pay a king's ransom for Ryan Kessler's $6.875 million deal. Or Johnny Boychuk's $6 million deal from Buffalo.

Essentially there are other options on the table for Vegas other than just dumping Dadonov. But Vegas is desperate and is only growing more desperate as Stone and Martinez get closer to full fitness.

Can the Isles "help" Vegas? Yes. Will they? That's a tough question to answer. Lou Lamoriello certainly likes to strike when there's an opportunity (that's how he unloaded Boychuk's deal), but we'll see if he'll do so in this scenario.