The Islanders are feeling confident after shaking the Canucks on their home ice in Vancouver.
The Islanders put a different lens on the early part of their five-game road trip by convincingly beating the Vancouver Canucks, 5-2 with the empty netter on top.
The power play scored(!) again, as Anders Lee continued his revival with a nice backhand pass from his doorstep office to JG Pageau. Lee scored himself later after Bo Horvat turned Quinn Hughes around, no small feat. Even Pierre Engvall got in on the action, scoring by parking himself in front of the net(!) and cleaning up the slop.
After pulling a point out of nowhere while being outplayed in Edmonton, the two regulation points in Vancouver were achieved without difficulty. They now head back over the border for the middle match of the trip in Seattle.
Islanders News
- About last night: a “confident” Islanders squad and a satisfying win for Bo Horvat. [NHL]
- Video recap, in case you were asleep or otherwise deposed. [Isles video]
- Most complete game of the season? Surely. [Newsday | Post]
- Patrick Roy and others feel this was the result of them steadily building their game. [Isles]
- Horvat was more comfortable returning to Vancouver this time around — even before his new team picked up the win. [Newsday | Post]
- Rick Tocchet apologized to Canucks fans for that showing. [Sportsnet | TSN]
Elsewhere
Last night’s NHL scores include nine other games, with the Flyers, Devils and Rangers all winning.
- Connor McDavid becomes the fourth-fastest to 1,000 points. Only Wayne Gretzky, Mario Lemieux and some guy named Mike Bossy reached it faster. [NHL]
- Andrei Vasilevskiy became the fastest goalie to 300 wins, although that needs one big fat asterisk in the “someone must be called the winner” shootout era. [NHL]
- Jets coach Scott Arniel finds himself counseling the team to learn from its rare loss. [TSN]