Marek: NY Islanders and Brock Boeser are a fit

The Bo Horvat trade has certainly worked out well for the NY Islanders. He's scored in three out of four games since he's been here, continuing the red-hot scoring pace he left off with when he was playing for the Vancouver Canucks. Yet, the Islanders, if they're still aiming to make the playoffs, aren't exactly a finished product. According to Jeff Marek via The Jeff Marek Show on Sportsnet, he believes that Horvat's former teammate, Brock Boeser, could certainly help the Islanders, too.

"I look at Brock Boeser and I say ‘okay, let me look around the NHL. Who needs help on the power play?’... The are that team.” - Jeff Marek

The Islanders certainly haven't had a great power play and Boeser certainly knows how to pot a goal on the man advantage. It's been a bit of an off-season for the Canucks and Boeser has suffered because of it. This year, he has just three power-play goals and on the season, he's recorded 10 goals and 35 points in 45 games. Yet, just a season ago, Boeser was dominant on the man advantage with 11 power-play goals on the year. That counted for almost half of his goals as he finished the 2021-22 season with 23 goals.

Boeser has consistency in the goal-scoring department, too. His best season came when he finished as the runner-up for the Calder Trophy to Mathew Barzal in the 2017-18 season scoring 29 goals. However, since then he's scored 20 or more goals in three out of four seasons. It's entirely possible that Boeser just needs a change in scenery as the toiling Canucks figure out what direction they're going in with their organization and for the Islanders, they're in a position where they don't have much coming through the pipeline, so why not add the young talent if possible?

The one problem the Islanders may run into is the fact that Boeser's cap hit runs at $6.65 million for the next two seasons. The Islanders could certainly afford that, however, have important contracts coming up in Oliver Wahlstrom and Ilya Sorokin in consecutive summers. Still, it's certainly possible if the Islanders can figure out how to effectively resign the necessary parts to reasonable contracts, and with names like Semyon Varlamov and Josh Bailey coming off the books in consecutive seasons, there will be room in the budget.