And there are a few other “D… words that can describe the Islanders season so far and it seems that “D… is the reason for many of them.
As of 7 am this morning, the Islanders are in 29th place in the NHL with 24 points. Only the Buffalo Sabres, their only trade partner, are below them with 17 points. Edmonton stands at 28th place with 25 points in 34 games. What happened?
In 34 games the Isles are 9-19-6 with a horrendous road record of 4-13-0. In 48 games last season, their road record was 14-6-4, better than their home record. But now with only 48 games remaining in this full season, the Isles look like they are headed for the bottom five once again instead of being playoff bound as we had all hoped.
It’s not the goal tending that’s killing them. While Isles have had their problems in net, we’ve also seen that Kevin Poulin can steal a game and Nabokov can keep them in one. Such was the case on a snowy Saturday night with a building filled with Habs fans once again. Nabokov took the Isles all the way to overtime letting in nothing until one wrong move left him vulnerable and the game was over.
As much as I like Aaron Ness, his play for the Isles has been noticeably bad. In 17 games, he is a -13. Only Colin McDonald has a worse +/= at 15. I’ve watched Ness put pucks into his own net off his skates and miss assignments in the crease. Of course he is young, but it’s not helping the Isles at all. Also, he's not the only one who has made such mistakes, but he's the newbie.
Ryan Strome made his long awaited NHL debut on Saturday and played well in front of the home crowd and his parents, but of course, one call-up from Bridgeport is not going to turn the team around over night. Strome is not a savior. No, what is sadly missing from this Islander line-up is -
LUBOMIR VISNOVSKY.
Has anyone seen him? Has he left the country?
At least with Lubo in the line-up the cracks in the Isles defense may be less noticeable. Perhaps Andrew MacDonald and Travis Hamonic won’t have to play the exorbitant amount of minutes they have been asked to play.
The Isles should be better than their record. They were supposed to be. They just haven’t been. Their great players are overworked, their good players are invisible.
Tomorrow they face Tampa Bay with a change to improve their home record. My personal opinion is if Jack Capuano doesn’t sit Aaron Ness for his mistakes then he is being too lenient on a team that is not giving their all. Too bad he can’t sit every player who is under performing, then it would truly be a one line team.